


Swarmborn

by Nihilistic_Janitor



Category: Overlord - Maruyama Kugane & Related Fandoms, Parahumans Series - Wildbow
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-14
Updated: 2020-07-14
Packaged: 2021-03-05 04:40:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 14
Words: 50,614
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25268515
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nihilistic_Janitor/pseuds/Nihilistic_Janitor
Summary: In which Taylor becomes trapped in the body of her MMO character.Note: This fic is abandoned, and also, i wrote it years ago and don't recommend it. I'm only posting it here for the sake of completion.
Comments: 5
Kudos: 23





	1. Chapter 1

_ Taylor hated school because of her bullies, but she loved Yggdrasil. It was so complex, so many tactics to try out, so many things to discover. Every day at school she had to play nice, sit there quietly as Emma and her band of rabid teens walked all over her. But when she got home? Then, then she could play Yggdrasil, a Virtual MMO, with all the new, real, actual friends she’d never had. Well, she’d had one. But now she had forty! Forty friends! Forty friends, helping her spin her way through the web of mechanics and stories and it was amazing. _

_ Their Guild was called The Hive, and it was incredible. They had an amazing, customized-to-the-gills, optimized-for-defense, tricked and trapped out base. They had laid claim to an astonishing stockpile of the most powerful items in the game, they’d created wonderful, beautiful, combat-ready but still unique and incredible character builds, they’d designed NPCs for the Hive that were so detailed they were practically alive themselves. _

_ And despite the rest of the players’ hate for monstrous races, which made up the entirety of The Hive, they hadn’t had a single raid party successfully beat Khepri’s Crypt. Oh sure, they’d had their fair share of PvP losses out in the wild, but they’d persevered, they’d clawed their way up, they’d made it. They were the premier guild of evil, horrific villains, according to their carefully crafted fluff. Taylor had even gone so far as to craft her avatar, Skitter, leader of the guild to be absolutely perfect for the role. Funny, given how the guild’s name had been at least a little inspired by the way her Swarmborn avatar led her allies in combat. It really was perfect. _

_ It didn’t last. Even as Taylor poured even more of her heart and soul into the game, even as she graduated high school and moved into her own apartment, her soul-crushing job going into preserving her ingame happiness, the game began to die. People started challenging Khepri’s Crypt less and less. Members of the Hive began to retire. Slowly, ever so slowly, Taylor found herself facing Emma’s abandonment all over again, except this time, instead of the horrid bullying, the world she lived for would just...stop. _

_ And now, Taylor sat in the great meeting hall, facing the one last member of her guild, her famous, powerful, incredible guild, as the server clock slowly ticked down to oblivion. _

* * *

Taylor sighed as she looked at the empty table in front of her. Enough seating for all 41 members of The Hive, beautiful, ominous, a true war room worthy of the greatest coalition of monsters Yggdrasil had ever known.

Now it was very nearly empty, save for two figures. Herself, an imperious figure draped in a form-fitting spidersilk dress. Far more beautiful than she could hope to be in real life. Still thin, but this version of her pulled it off in a regal, villainous way. Many hours were spent messing with cosmetic items, trying to get her look just right. Hours had gone into making sure hers was a form that could inspire awe and terror when she arrived on the battlefield, panicking other PvPers with reputation and image before the first spell was cast. Not that it mattered anymore.

The last friend of hers to show up sat a short distance apart from her, in the seat she always took. The slight smirk of her avatar, still there after all this time. Their rogue, scout, information dealer. Sure, she was nothing special in combat, but in a game like Yggdrasil, where information was far more useful and far, far more deadly? Clever players like Tattletale were worth their weight in gold. The vampire sat under the light, her blonde hair shimmering in the room’s light, and Taylor couldn’t help but be thankful that Lisa had decided to stay with her, after all. That the one who had brought her here, into this guild, in the first place, would stick with her to the bitter end, even after so long.

It seemed like so long ago that she was a miserable, friendless high school student. Forever ago. Hazy memories, overwritten by far, far more happy ones in this virtual world.

“Thanks for staying, Lisa.” She said. Her voice hitched a little, not that the static face of her avatar would betray any emotion. 

“Of course, Taylor. You’ve really been taking care of this place, haven’t you.” It wasn’t a question.

“I had to make sure it was always ready whenever anyone wanted to come back.”

That no one had went unspoken between them. Lisa seemed more mature than Taylor was used to, she could remember Tattletale’s arrogance and love of her own voice getting the HIve into trouble many times. Reality seemed to have mellowed her out, in the years that had passed since her last logon.

Lisa broke the silence. “It was nice to hear from you again. I’ve been so busy with my job, lately. Nice to take a break from it. Calvert’s a real slave driver, you know?”

“Still working for him?”

“Ah, yeah. I hate the guy’s guts, but he pays well, at least. Not like I’m gonna land a better consulting gig somewhere else, right?”

“Yeah, I guess.”

Another moment of silence passed, and it hurt Taylor. She remembered when she could talk to Lisa for hours on end without stopping. Now, there didn’t really seem to be anything to say.

Suddenly, Lisa jerked in her seat, and uttered a muffled curse. “Oh, shit! Taylor, I’m so sorry, I’ve got to go. I just got an email, I’m needed.”

_ But it’s so late! Can’t you just pretend you’re asleep, or something?  _ “Oh, okay. Well, goodnight, I guess.”

“Hey, don’t sound so down. Shoot me an email when you find another MMO to take by storm. We’ll take it on together. I’ll make time.” She shot out a winking emoticon.

_ I really doubt that. This was the only email of mine you’ve answered ever since you left. _ “Yeah, alright. I’ll see you later then.” Taylor put up a smiling emoticon, then watched as she logged off.

Taylor watched the empty seat for a brief moment, then sagged. Not even Lisa would stay with her to the end. Three people had shown up today, three people answered the forty emails she sent out. And not even they wanted to stay with her to the end.

Taylor sat there for a moment, then looked at her hand, activating the racial ability of the Greater Swarmborn, watching as her hand began dissolving into the swarm of insects she could control.  _ That was still cool, at least. _ She canceled the ability, and watched her hand return to normal, coalescing out of bugs and melding into the humanoid hand she wore when she stayed at base.

_ It really was worth it. Making this character totally insect-themed in every way, Swarm Mana giving me alternate casting animations that used bugs to cast spells, racial abilities to turn into and command bugs, it made Skitter so terrifying. The Lord of the Swarm, the Hive Queen, at the head of her army of monstrous players, at the head of a dungeon no number of players could beat. _

Taylor couldn’t keep it up, though. The image of the fearsome Guildmaster, mastermind of a thousand schemes, a weaver of fate. Now she was just Taylor again, with no Guild. Just Taylor, the gangly, plain woman with a dead-end office job and a tiny apartment. Taylor, whose only passion was about to vanish as soon as that fucking server clock hit midnight. The Hive she and her Guildmates had put together. So much effort, so much time, so many memories, all gone in half an hour.

She stood. She might as well go for a little walk. It wasn’t like anyone else would show up. She’d sit in her throne on the tenth floor one last time, survey her domain, her servants. She’d dress in her full regalia, wield the Guild Weapon that her HIve had poured themselves into and never saw use, and Skitter would see her full potential realized. Just this once. There were no more risks. There was no need for more caution. She could equip herself with whatever she wanted, nobody would be here to assassinate her anymore. Nobody would storm the gates, would demand the Hive return the World Item they stole, nobody would swear bloody vengeance as they watched their friends fall into the Crypt’s traps, as the Guardians tore their parties apart.

It was all over, all of it.

She drew her swarm of bugs to her, and they coalesced into the chitinous armor she had optimized for herself, long ago. Lightweight enough to dodge, heavy enough to prevent being one-shot by the more powerful bosses, and it posed no issue for her to cast her signature Insect spells through. It was dark, and shimmered, and the smooth, mottled obsidian curves of each plate locked together beautifully. Her claws were wicked, and sharp. She could feel the effects she had enchanted into it take effect, her stats rising. The helmet sealed around her face. She couldn’t see it, but she knew its wicked mandibles and gleaming yellow lenses gave her the uncanny look she needed to cultivate. The only vaguely human aspect about her avatar was the long, flowing, curly brown hair, more luxurious even than her hair in real life. The one holdover from the other world she brought here. Everything else could go hang.

She walked to the back of the room, and her eyes rested on the staff her allies had forged into her perfect weapon. It gleamed in perfect darkness, shuddering slightly, pulsing with energy as if it were alive. Gleaming, multifaceted gems, like insect eyes, adorned the lovingly crafted head of the staff. Slowly, delicately, her clawed hand wrapped around it, and she watched her stats rise ever further.

Staff in hand, she walked out of the war room, and made her way along. One of the Custodians, a low-level air elemental, drifted past her as she went. According to the fluff of the Crypt, they handled the day-to-day chores. Really, they just drifted through the halls like ghosts, nodding to the players they passed. Occasionally, someone might need equipment carried, or minor repairs made to the structure, but usually, they just drifted.

_ Probably a more fulfilling job than mine.  _ She thought bitterly. Still, she was Skitter for a few minutes more, at least.

Moving further, she saw the Crypt’s last line of defense standing in front of the door to the throne room. The Final Wards. Led by Miss Militia, a Dark Elf dressed in military fatigues and wearing a stars and stripes bandanna over her mouth, leading the group of children that would delay attackers long enough for the Hive to regroup and prepare for a final assault. Of course, nobody had ever gotten this far. And so, the Wards had never really seen combat.

_ Vista, Gallant, Glory Girl, Cuff, Golem, Tecton. _ Carefully crafted, with beautiful, tear-jerking backstories. Not that anyone outside the guild had ever seen them. Taylor shook her head a little. So much hard work. Well, she might as well have them with her in her last moments as Skitter. She ordered them to follow.

Taylor strode into the throne room, Wards trailing behind. She could see her throne, black and red and ominous, ahead of her. She couldn’t help but smile inwardly, thinking about the arguments they’d had over the decor in here, deciding ultimately on the intimidating and dark room before her. Standing beside her throne; the Guardian who was designated as the overseer of the rest of the Crypt, Dragon. A clockwork automata with plates of porcelain skin over muscles of tiny, tightly packed bronze gears and springs, visible through the spaces between her skin. Taylor had to admit, Colin had done a good job when he’d designed this NPC. 

She told the Wards to line up in front of the throne, then she sat down in it. The clock ticked onwards, and she pulled up Dragon’s excessively detailed backstory to read as the time passed, before it disappeared.

She almost laughed. Colin, for all his stupid, shortsighted, glory-hounding ways that got him killed on more than one occasion, was a good guy. Dragon was, apparently, freed from a cruel prison in the past that she had been forced to design herself. Genuinely good person, believed in justice, good at building things. Taylor read through the whole thing, thinking about Colin all the while. The arrogant prick who charged in to try and get the killing blow on the raid boss, who’d spent hours on hours talking poor Jack Slash’s ear off about his electrical engineering job, who’d shared a spreadsheet with his analysis of Yggdrasil’s enchanting system with the rest of us that he’d gone without sleep for days to make.

Taylor missed him dearly.

The clock ticked onwards. She closed the information tab with only a minute remaining. She released the staff, letting it float in front of her, and leaned back on the throne. As an afterthought, she ordered the Wards and Dragon to kneel. Might as well look the part of the aloof villain in her last moments. She’d wait until the servers were all gone, and then she’d go to bed, and then she’d go to work, and then...

And then she’d figure something out. The clock ticked down, and she closed her eyes.

_ If only I could stay Skitter a little longer. _


	2. Chapter 2

Taylor slowly opened her eyes, then gave a little yawn. She hadn’t slept well. It seemed she’d fallen asleep in her chair. She felt a little stiff as she rubbed the sleep out of her eyes and blinked a few times.

Then her brain caught up with her eyes. Clear as day, around her, was the throne room of Khepri’s Crypt, with Dragon and the Wards kneeling in front of her, plain as day. Looking down, she saw she was still clad in her chitinous armor. She blinked again. The game was still running? She almost wanted to jump for joy. The game was still running! She could be Skitter a little longer! Not much longer, though. The HUD seemed to have vanished, and that was hardly a good sign. Still, she was still he-

“Lady Skitter, are you alright?”

Taylor started. Where had that voice come from? Had one of her guild mates come online and messaged her? She would have to-

“Lady Skitter?” Taylor watched as Dragon stood from where she was kneeling, a concerned expression on her mechanical face.  _ Wait, expression? Yggdrasil didn’t have expressions. _

“I am fine, Dragon. Give me a moment, something’s wrong.” Dragon’s worried expression didn’t fade, but she took a step back from the throne. Taylor took a moment, and thought. Dragon was acting with a strange amount of fidelity, and she’d responded to a nonstandard command. She was sure Dragon’s gears hadn’t actually spun before she’d fallen asleep, too. And the fact that her lips moved when she talked, and her face had actual expressions...

Taylor tried to open a GM call, but nothing happened. She couldn’t message anyone, either, not even the very few friends she’d made outside the guild. Her HUD was gone, and she felt a little strange. Her armor weighed a little on her skin, cool where it pressed against-

Wait, touch? Yggdrasil had amazing visuals and sound design, but those were the only senses they had available in the game. No HUD, new senses, and the NPCs were acting oddly as well, acting far outside their normal programming. She had to test something.

“Miss Militia, please come over here.”

“Yes, ma’am.” Taylor saw the Wards move slightly, watching Miss Militia as she approached.

“Miss Militia, please, hold out your arm for me to inspect.”

She did, and Taylor dispersed her clawed gauntlet into its constituent bugs. Miss Militia tensed slightly as Taylor wrapped her bare hand around the dark elf’s wrist, feeling for a pulse. And there it was!

Well, that seemed like proof enough. The NPCs were, somehow, at least partially alive, and the world seemed to have approached reality to a disturbing degree. She had to learn more.

“Miss Militia, take the Wards and take a look outside the Crypt’s walls. Tell me if there are monsters moving strangely, or in greater numbers than is normal.”

“Yes, ma’am.” Miss Militia, for all her newfound life, didn’t seem to be very talkative. She curtly marched off, and with a nod, the Wards fell in line behind her. They didn’t move with anywhere near the diligent purpose Miss Militia had, at odds with the synchronized motions they’d displayed before. Taylor was fairly sure Glory Girl had stolen a glance at her before they left the throne room.

Taylor rose, and turned to Dragon, who still looked concerned. Dragon spoke, “Lady Skitter, has something happened? Should I rally our defenses?”

Taylor turned to her, and tried to speak in the imperious tones of the villain Skitter. If this was as real as she was starting to think it was, she should play the part as best she could. “Dragon, gather all the Guardians in the temple on the 6th floor, except for the Guardians of the 4th and 8th floors. I wish to speak to them soon.”

Dragon nodded. “Of course.” She strode out the room briskly, leaving Taylor alone. Taylor nodded, as soon as she left. First test, if the guild’s teleportation rings still worked without an HUD.

Standing in the temple a few moments later, she concluded that items worked fine. She stepped out into the massive amphitheater where adventurers would fight the Guardians of his floor. Massive statues ringed the stone floor, grey women praying to some unseen deity. A massive bonfire sat in the center of the room, roaring with flame.

Taylor didn’t see the Guardians, though. That was strange, she last left them just standing here, guarding this place. Then again, if they were alive now, they could be pretty much anywhere.

Then, striding out of the fire, came the two Guardians of the 6th floor. One was a fey, gossamer wings drifting behind her, green robe stretching to the ground, her skin and light blonde hair glowing slightly white, even in the firelight. The other was a Daemonkin, purplish-red skin, dark brown hair blowing in some unseen breeze, tail whipping restlessly, red dress untouched by the flames, scarred face and green eyes peering towards Taylor.

Taylor smiled. It was nice to see Faultline’s creations brought to life like this. Taylor didn’t remember every detail of the backstory Faultline and her friends had put together for these two, but she did remember that they were like sisters to each other, having suffered through something together in the distant past. Realizing that she still had it on, she dismissed her mask as the two of them approached. No point in looking intimidating in front of them, it’d be better to try and talk to them normally, judge exactly how real they were.

Burnscar, seeing Taylor dismiss her mask, jogged up to her, dragging a somewhat less enthusiastic Labyrinth behind her. “Hello, Aunt Skitter!” Burnscar said with a smile. “How come you’re down here? Did something happen?” Burnscar seemed to remember something, and poked the girl beside her, whispering, “Labyrinth, say hello to Aunt Skitter.”

Labyrinth’s eyes, which had been unfocused, suddenly snapped back to reality and her eyes fell on Taylor. She straightened up a little, tried to neaten her robe, and stammered, “H-hello Aunt Skitter.”

It was nice, seeing the two of them actually moving, talking, having voices and showing their character beyond the block of text in their descriptions. Taylor took a moment to breathe, thinking about how she was going to do this as Skitter. Then she decided against it. These were her friends precious creations, she might as well just be Taylor to them. Skitter was the PvP lord, terrifying, stalking through the night, killing those who opposed her, but Taylor was the shy, kinda dorky girl who the people in her guild were actually friends with. She might as well treat their creations the same as she did them.

“Hi, you two. I just came down to test a couple of things out. I think something strange has happened. Do you guys feel different or strange at all?”

Burnscar and Labyrinth shared a slightly worried look, then turned back to Taylor. “I don’t think so...” Burnscar answered.

“Well, in that case, can you help me out? I need to test a little of my magic, and I want to make sure you two can fight well, too. I’m going to summon a monster for the two of you to fight.”

Burnscar looked eager, and shifted into a fighting stance already, but Labyrinth looked a little more nervous. Taylor moved a little ways away as Burnscar gave her friend a little pep talk. Taylor took a moment to think. She didn’t have her spell or skill icons, but she’d dismissed her helmet with a thought. Perhaps magic was the same way? She focused for a moment, then realized she could feel her MP and spells inside of her somehow. Reaching in and pushing out, she aimed in front of the Guardians.

[Summon Greater Broodqueen]

A massive carapaced monster, drooling acid and sporting massive chitinous blades on its forearms, coalesced from the swarm drifting around Taylor. Funny how these massive, level eighty monsters were technically classified as Insectoid Vermin. Open to a lot of fun exploits because of it, too.

Burnscar leapt into action immediately, using her limited repertoire of spells to begin pelting the battlefield with inexhaustible flames, then using the Greater Daemonkin hidden skill, [Flamestep], to move around the beast with blistering speed, delivering flame-wreathed strikes to it.

Labyrinth, meanwhile, supplemented her ally by warping the battlefield, using [Supreme Creation] as an offensive spell due to a combination of her skills, sinking the massive insect into an oily, flammable quagmire, and binding it with strange, thorny, iridescent vines.

Two level 100, carefully minmaxed Guardians against a single level 80 monster? It was no contest. It did, however prove to Taylor that magic, skills, and enchanted items were all working fine. So, while everything was far more realistic, game mechanics were preserved. Now she just had to figure out what had happened, why it had happened, and who else was here.

Actually, she could make a little headway on that last one. She’d tried to pull up the old console messaging features, but she hadn’t tried using the spell [Message]. Now that she cast it, she could sense that it had valid targets. Not any of the players she knew, nor any of the GMs, but the NPCs, apparently. As a test run, she called Miss Militia.

“Ma’am?”

“Hello, Miss Militia. How does it look out there? Are the Wards alright?”

“The Wards are fine, ma’am. No monsters within sight. However, we do not appear to be in the swamp the Crypt was originally in.”

“What?”

“We appear to be in an open grassland. The Wards are scouting, I’ll be back to deliver you our findings shortly.”

“Come to the temple on the 6th floor. The Guardians will be there, and it’s probably important for everyone to know the results.”

“Of course. Thank you, ma’am.”

The spell fizzled out, and Taylor mused briefly on how formal Miss Militia sounded. Then, she felt her summoned creature die, and turned back to the two guardians on this floor. Labyrinth was already cleaning up the battlefield, while Burnscar was taking a few deep breaths and stretching slightly. Taylor walked back over to them. Burnscar beamed when she came over.

“That was super fun! Thanks for summoning that for us. Nothing like a good fight, eh, Labyrinth?”

Labyrinth let out a quiet, noncommittal mumble as she finished repairing the temple, and Burnscar turned to look at her. “Oh come on, we both know you love showing off what you can make.” She grinned, and Labyrinth offered a small smile in return.

Taylor couldn’t help but smile herself. Then, a thought occurred to her. “Are you two thirsty?” Burnscar hemmed and hawed, but Labyrinth just nodded and poked Burnscar in a mirror of what happened earlier. Taylor reached out into empty space.

She knew she’d had an inventory back in Yggdrasil. Just have to figure out how to get to it, and-there! Bugs converged on her hand, then flew away, revealing a flask. More bugs revealed two small glasses on the ground, and Taylor poured them each a drink. If she remembered right, the flask had some sort of enchantment to endlessly pour clean water, but it had been one of the many, many items she’d picked up out of a vague sense of future usefulness. 

It was a way to supplement the fact that her build severely limited how many spells she could know. Only 200, when some mages in the Hive knew upwards of 700! Still, her spell list had been carefully engineered for versatility and taken care of, where she doubted less focused casters had anywhere near the organizational masterpiece that was her spell repertoire. Plus, she had a lot of really, really cool bug spells.

She watched as Burnscar and Labyrinth drank, then put away the flask and the glasses when they were done. Burnscar looked at her when she was finished. “How come you aren’t all scary now? Whenever you were here to watch people fight us during invasions, you looked all kinds of scary, but you’re just being a nice Auntie.”

Taylor chuckled. “You know, I’m not a villainous mastermind round the clock. And you guys are important to me. I’m not going to be some spooky bug lady to you guys if I don’t have to.”

Labyrinth actually seemed a little less freaked out after that, while Burnscar just smirked and said something about liking the spooky bug lady thing. However, interrupting the conversation was a girlish giggle from across the temple grounds. Skipping across carelessly was a young girl, maybe eleven or twelve, blonde hair in little ringlets. She wore a classic pure white clerical robe, in the style of every magical healer ever, but dried blood marred the sleeves and the hem, and a plethora of twisted steel medical tools with blood-spattered handles and cleaned, gleaming blades bounced merrily around her waist. Including the one that bore her name, the one that raiding parties had learned to fear.

Bonesaw.

_ God, Jack Slash was good at making things terrifying. _ Taylor thought.  _ He would have loved to see her brought to life like this. _

Even as the girl came to a stop next to Burnscar and Labyrinth, Taylor could see that her eyes were dull, as if they were made of glass, and her movements were just a little too smooth, her expressions just a little too wide to be human. Which she wasn’t, Taylor knew. She was a Revenant, a high-tier zombie. She was also, contrary to her clothing, crazy powerful in combat, even ignoring her disturbing habit of resurrecting fallen foes to fight for her as frankenstein’s monster-esque constructs.

Her voice, though, was as innocent as her appearance would make it seem. “Big Sis!” She leapt forward with frightening speed, and was hugging Taylor before she could even react. She buried her face into Taylor’s armor, and Taylor could hear her muffled voice. “I haven’t seen you or any of the Creators down on the first three floors in  _ ages _ !” Taylor just gave a little smile and patted Bonesaw’s head reassuringly. The girl acted really innocent. It was endearing.

Bonesaw looked up at Taylor. “You’re still here. You’re gonna stay, right? You aren’t gonna leave, right?”

“Of course not, Bonesaw.”

“C’mon, call me little sis, or something!” Bonesaw took a step back and pouted.

“Okay, okay, little sis. C’mon, you should take a moment to talk to Burnscar and Labyrinth. I bet you don’t see each other much.”

“But I wanna talk with  _ you, _ big sis!”

A few minutes of lighthearted chatter passed. Taylor marveled at how human the NPCs were. It was nice, seeing little echoes of her friends, even after they’d gone. It was...easy, talking with them. Effortless. Not like the players she went out of her way to avoid, grinding gold during her lonely time maintaining the guild after everyone had left. 

Then, Lung came. The massive silver-scaled dragonkin sauntered across in a cocky, self-assured manner, wearing a massive leather biker jacket. He acknowledged Taylor with quiet respect and dignity before he sat down. He took the pestering from Burnscar and Bonesaw with considerably less dignity, and yelled at them angrily to leave him alone. That didn’t really stop them.

Finally, Dragon came in with a pale fiend in a dignified charcoal-grey pinstriped suit. His hair was blond, neatly trimmed, and he looked remarkably normal, holding a clipboard and adjusting a pair of thin-rimmed glasses. Well, excepting the tail made of coins, decreasing in size until they tapered off into nothingness, making a slight jingling sound as he walked. Harbinger.

Dragon, dressed in her at-ease green and gold outfit, brushed her dark hair back, gears whirring under her porcelain skin-plates. “Excepting Grey Boy of the 8th floor, and the Endbringers of the 4th, all the Guardians are present and accounted for, Lady Skitter. We will now begin the meeting.”

Taylor- _ No, Skitter now. It’s business time. _ \- Reformed her mask as the Guardians lined up neatly in front of her. Dragon’s authoritative voice echoed in the temple as she said, “Now, the Guardians will all pledge their loyalty to the Master of the Crypt, Skitter.”  _ Wait, what? That’s really not- _

Before Skitter had a chance to object, Bonesaw was already kneeling. “Guardian of the first three floors, Bonesaw, pledges her loyalty.”

They went down the line, kneeling down one by one. Skitter felt it was a pointless formality, but she had to admit it was good for her villainous image, at any rate. It still felt very strange, though. These were her friends’ precious creations. Watching them kneel like this pained her. They should be happy, content, not on their knees as if she would kill them if they displeased her.

The odd ritual finished quickly though, with Dragon raising her eyes and saying, “Thus we, the Guardians of Khepri’s Crypt, pledge our undying loyalty to you.” Skitter still felt off-balance from the display of deference, but some things were more important that her awkward feelings. She decided to just launch straight into business.  _ Oh, but first, image. _

Skitter released the tight hold she’d had suppressing her mana to keep her swarm invisible, and bugs roared out of the immediate environment to fill the area around Skitter with a roiling mass of insects. She could see the Guardians react slightly, which was good. The right sort of image, even if she didn’t really want to scare them, of the sort of villain they could be proud to follow.

“Guardians!” Her voice boomed in what she hoped was an imperious and commanding tone. “Our Crypt today faces an unknown threat! First off, have any of you noticed anything strange happening on any of your floors?”

They all answered in the negative.  _ Well, at least the inside of the Crypt wasn’t affected beyond the living NPCs. _ Skitter continued, “Miss Militia, strongest of our number at long range, was sent out with her Wards to investigate! She should return momentarily, and be able to give us a full briefing.”

As if on cue, Miss Militia strode out of the shadows at that moment and kneeled. “Lady Skitter, I have the results of the reconnaissance.”

“And?”

Miss Militia took a breath, then began to speak. “We appear to be in an empty plain. No roaming monsters of any sort were identified. Judging by the clear and starry sky and the non-hostile landscape, the Crypt seems to have been transported out of Helheim entirely. No intelligent life of any kind was observed nearby.”

“Thank you,” spoke Skitter, “Clearly, due to the difficult-to-decipher nature of this anomaly, our typical defenses may not be adequate. Harbinger, Dragon, I am relying on you to develop a defensive strategy suitable for use against a hypothetical foe powerful enough to transport the Crypt like this. In the meantime, we need a way to hide the Crypt from prying eyes, to prevent other attacks. Labyrinth, is there any way you can do this?”

Labyrinth was startled by being addressed so suddenly, and for a moment her mouth moved without noise coming out of it, until Burnscar reached out and squeezed her hand.

“I could, um, make a forest around us, then place an illusion over the top to hide is from above?” Her voice shook, and Skitter reflected that perhaps acting the villain wasn’t the best thing for Labyrinth. 

As such, she decided to try and reassure her. In a slightly less imperious tone, she said, “That’s a good plan, but we need to consider that some players may wander into a newly created forest and try to fight us. Do you have any large-range AOE Confusion spells?”

“Um, yes.”

“Good. I’ll give you a scroll of [Permanency], then, and you can make sure the forest will also get people lost and make them wander back out.” As Skitter reached into her inventory to retrieve the scroll, she looked around at the Guardians, and made another decision.

“Also, each one of you shall receive a Ring of the Hive so you can teleport freely.”

A chorus of voices responded in disbelief and denial, far stronger than Skitter had expected. Everyone was talking over each other in protest. Skitter silenced them with a wave of her hand, then continued. “It doesn’t matter how unworthy you think you are, it doesn’t matter that formerly these rings were only given to those of the Hive itself. This is an emergency, and higher mobility could prevent disaster. I won’t allow anything preventable to happen if it may harm the Crypt,”  _ Or any of you,  _ She added mentally. Not a very Skitter-ish thing to say, but she hoped they got the sentiment.

The Guardians still felt the need to go through a ridiculous little bowing-and-scraping bit before they would even touch the rings. Skitter felt worried as Lung nearly pressed his scaly head to the dirt in a bow, reciting some sort of lengthy thanks in Japanese. While she appreciated loyalty, and was glad that her Guardians felt it so strongly, she couldn’t help but feel worried about their mental state if whatever had brought them to life them had chained them with compulsions like this. She would have much preferred to have them stay by her side because they wanted to, not because their ‘allied’ status in the game decided to manifest itself as some bizarre parody of subservience.

Then she realized that she’d thought of them as hers, and cringed inwards a bit. She  _ led  _ them, she didn’t  _ own  _ them. They had their own feelings, their own motivations, and she didn’t want to trample any of that underfoot in the name of the Hive. They were, effectively, as much members of it as Regent or Glaistig Uaine had been. She had to treat them like people, not like NPCs. Hell, she was reluctant to throw them out into the world out there, given how little she knew about it. The last thing she wanted was to see one of her friends’ virtual children harmed because of her orders.

Skitter would have to play her villainy as safely as possible.  _ Especially if,  _ she suddenly thought,  _ Every monster in here is sentient, not just the most powerful ones. Can I really send what are effectively people to die, even if they’re low level? This might not be a game anymore, relying on expendable forces might not be possible. _

Still, she finished handing out the rings to the prostate Guardians, and decided to wrap the meeting up while her persona as Skitter was still unaffected by her uncomfortably squirming thoughts. “Alright. If I am required, I’ll be in my quarters.” With that, she turned as dramatically as she could, and with an attempt at a flourish, drew her swarm close around her. Hopefully obscured from the Guardians, Skitter turned back into Taylor and teleported away.

* * *

The Guardians slowly stood from where they were kneeling. Nobody spoke for a moment, as the bugs that had been blocking out the artificial sky on this floor slowly dissipated. Labyrinth awkwardly rubbed the ring she’d received, as if it were a little too tight. As if it hadn’t shrunk to fit perfectly as soon as it had been slipped on.

Bonesaw was the first to speak. “She wasn’t as scary as I thought she’d be.” Her brow furrowed as she tried to figure out if that had been a good or bad thing.

Lung grunted assent. “I have seen Skitter when she fights. That was not the same Skitter I saw during the invasions.”

Labyrinth mumbled something nobody could hear.

Harbinger looked over at Lung. “It is still Skitter. She led the Hive. She is the strongest of the Creators. It would not do to doubt her simply because she did not act the way you expected.”

Lung shot Harbinger a glare. “I was not doubting her. I am simply concerned that enemies may attempt to prey on her if she cannot inspire more fear.”

Harbinger raised an eyebrow. “So you’re saying that you doubt her ability to fight off her enemies? That still sounds treasonous.” He spoke with a joking tone, but somewhere under the joke was a sharp edge.

Lung growled in response. “I would advise you not to anger me, pencil-pusher.”

Before Harbinger could open his mouth, Dragon spoke up. “We should probably address more important matters.” Lung spluttered something about insults being important, and Dragon ignored him. “Skitter’s actions may indicate more pressing issues that we should be prepared for. Miss Militia, most of us have not seen much of Skitter since most of the Hive...left. I suspect you have, though. Was she acting worrisomely then, too?”

“Sorry, she didn’t pass me often in the halls, and when she did, she was silent,” Miss Militia said, “Regardless, I should be guarding her. I’ll notify you of any orders that come in.” She strode off.

Dragon shook her head. “Look, everyone. I know we’re all feeling the absence of the rest of the Hive keenly, but I suspect Skitter is feeling it most keenly of all, and she fears for their safety during this emergency. She is putting a lot of faith in us to pick up the slack.” Dragon’s hand unconsciously went to her ring. “As Overseer, I have an additional order for you all. Make sure to do your jobs to your utmost. Hopefully, it will improve Skitter’s mood, and she’ll return to her usual fearsome self in time. If, in the meantime, you think of something that could make her feel better, please tell me, and we can implement it together.”

Labyrinth nudged Burnscar, but Burnscar didn’t seem to notice, focused instead on Dragon’s orders and the ring on her own hand.

“Now, everyone,” Dragon said, “We must attend to our orders. Burnscar, guard Labyrinth as she grows the forest. Lung, Bonesaw, come with myself and Harbinger. It would be best to have as many as possible working on the new defensive plans.”

Labyrinth tried to say something, but everyone was already moving. Burnscar grabbed her arm and pulled lightly. “Come on, Elle, we have work to do. You alright? You seemed a little spaced out there.”

Labyrinth said in a quiet voice. “I liked nice Skitter. She was too scary in the fights.”

“What was that, Elle? You gotta speak up. C’mon, we need to hurry, make Skitter proud that she gave us the rings. Gotta earn ‘em, right?”

Labyrinth shook her head, then gave her friend Mimi a small smile and followed her out of the Crypt. 


	3. Chapter 3

Taylor stood facing herself in the mirror. She had to say, she was glad she’d put so much effort into this avatar. Then she turned to look at the rest of the room.

Parian’s pride and joy, the Dollhouse. Mannequins, clothes, armors, everything and everything she’d designed was in here. The woman worked as if she was possessed. And somehow still found time to get a fashion degree and make this her job too. Taylor shook her head. She could remember Parian talking about how she, “Loved having the space to practice all her designs without worrying about wasting expensive materials.” And she also took it upon herself to tailor custom armor for everyone. She’d said that was because she felt guilty about always hanging back during combat. Hazards of going for a crafter.

Taylor let the nostalgia whirl in eddies around her. Flechette had actually been one of the three to visit on the last day of Yggdrasil, and she’d mentioned that she’d moved in with Parian recently. Nice to know something good had come of their time in the Hive. Then, a jingle of metal, and the on-duty Custodian, dressed in the doll mask that indicated that she had been Parian’s assistant in here, carefully laid the requested equipment on the ground next to Taylor. Taylor gingerly picked up a large sword from the pile.

A few minutes and some brief frustration later, she discovered that trying to use a weapon that her classes wouldn’t normally allow her to resulted in said weapon ending up on the ground somehow as soon as she swung it. No matter how good a grip she tried to have on it, it would slide out as if it were coated in grease. When it came down to game mechanics versus reality, clearly reality won. Taylor thanked the Custodian for her help, told her to return the equipment to where it was supposed to be, and left.

As she strode through the well-lit halls of the 10th floor, her appointed guard followed a few paces behind her. Much as she loathed having a personal guard, she had to admit that Dragon’s plan did make sense, and that even just having them to carry messages if she was attacked was useful. Not that the Ward following her with wide puppy eyes was something she enjoyed.

The Ward in question, Vista, had wide puppy eyes in a fairly literal sense. She was a Beastkin, specifically, one with puppy ears, a cute little tail, and a giant wolfish monster form when she wanted to get angry. The thing about her beast form was that it had specifically been specced to allow her to still cast her signature invisible space-warping spells and fight with all of her prodigious technique, making her just about as dangerous as a Ward could be.

Naturally, she was also the youngest-looking. Mouse Protector had a lot of say in the Wards’ design, and had thrown in a lot of little odd details like that. She’d also designed a convoluted shipping chart for all of the NPCs in the Crypt, including, oddly enough, the Custodians and Doctor Mother. Luckily, the only NPCs she’d actually been able to edit the backstories of were the Wards. Or unluckily for them, as the case may be.

Regardless, Vista had been doing a little hero-worship routine all day, which was slowly getting Taylor more and more annoyed. It was one thing to have a little girl gushing about how cool you were, sure. But when the gushing continued nonstop, from as soon as Taylor had left her cavernous and slightly unnerving bedroom to the moment she found herself back in there, it was a bit much. 

Still, Taylor didn’t really have the heart to tell her to stop. She seemed so happy to be talking to her, and to be away from the rest of the Wards, and getting a chance to see the rest of the majestic villain lair that was the 10th floor. The Wards had never seen a whole lot of use, given that their role as a last line of defense was never fulfilled. Taylor had already decided to try and make it up to them by making sure they had plenty to do in their new life. Also, NPCs apparently remembered their time as NPCs. Which was sort of strange.

For now, the Wards took turns with guard duty. Taylor was still figuring out how she wanted to go about investigating this new place she found herself in. She’d already agreed to Dragon’s defensive plan, which involved her not setting foot out of the Crypt until it was proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that there weren’t assassins lurking just outside the gate to gank her. But that wasn’t going to stop her, she just needed to find Miss Militia and have a good scry.

A moment later Vista was replaced with the far less chatty Miss Militia, and Taylor sat down with a magic item to scout out the surroundings without having to be there in person. Naturally, the damn thing was designed to be used with an actual interface, so Taylor just kind of sat there flailing her arms like an idiot until she figured out the new controls. Miss Militia, thankfully, didn’t say anything. Even though Taylor was pretty sure she was grinning under that scarf of hers.

“Good job, Lady Skitter.”  _ Wow, she somehow said that without it sounding sarcastic or condescending. She’s good. _

Regardless, Taylor couldn’t see anything through the scrying lens except grass. Not that it kept her from panning around, trying to figure out if there was anything nearby, looking for- aha! A road! And roads lead to civilization, which means, hopefully, information and resources. Taylor eagerly followed the road, only to find something horrific.

A group of knights were slaughtering a village. The villagers weren’t even fighting back, just running and being cut down by the brutal warriors, some on foot, others running down civilians of horseback. Taylor stiffened. It was a massacre. Blood on the streets.

“Is something the matter, ma’am?” Miss Militia asked, walking over to get a look at the scrying lens. Taylor saw, out of the corner of her eye, Miss Militia clench her fists as she saw. She looked like she was barely suppressing a volcano of rage.

_ Fuck fuck fuck. I can’t just sit here and do nothing! But I also need to act like Skitter, the cruel and cold villainess who would never save people unless they had something she wanted and oh who am I kidding I’ll justify it later. _

Skitter waved her arms over the lens, and saw there was a forest close to the village that would be just right to hide a [Gate] in, and an empty area behind a building that could serve as another. Then Skitter noticed two girls running down a path through that forest, pursued by a pair of bloodthirsty knights.  _ Okay, no time to waste. _

“Miss Militia, get a low tier weapon out, hide your ears, rescue those girls, and try to incapacitate the knights without killing them. Tell me what you think their level might be. The more exact the better. Go!” Skitter punctuated her last remark with a [Gate], and bugs started tearing a hole in reality between the Crypt and an area a little ways away from the road, hidden by foliage. Miss Militia needed no further prompting, and with a greenish flash exchanging her weapon, she dove through the portal. That done, Skitter opened a [Message] to Dragon.

“Lady Skit-”

“Get a low-tier battlesuit on, prep a higher tier one for deployment in case things go pear-shaped, and head through the portal in the scrying room!” With that, she terminated the call. Dragon wouldn’t question it.

Skitter dispelled the first [Gate], trusting that Miss Militia would [Message] her if things went badly, and made another one in the out-of-sight backlot. She needed to get there fast, but she hadn’t seen anyone use magic yet, and she didn’t know how rare it was here, so it wouldn’t do to go showing off powerful spells and making herself a target. Skitter had learned the value of misdirecting opponents as to her strength a long time ago.

She didn’t know how strong these knights actually were, though. She did know that the minimum level for a typical warrior-classed human to one-shot a level one villager with mundane equipment was level five, but for all Skitter knew, level one villagers in this world could be the equivalent of level 100 players in Yggdrasil. If they were, she would have little recourse but to flee and try to fashion a better plan. As it was, though, her current plan was to put all the showmanship skills Jack Slash had taught her to the test and save this village. 

She had to make sure to portray herself as only a little bit stronger than the knights. She had to seem stronger than them, but not so strong that they would flee or try to get reinforcements specifically to attack her. To further the illusion, she wasn’t using her normal gear, instead swapping it for a less impressive lightly armored battle-dress and a Staff of the Wasp, a large whorled wasp nest out of which the bugs constantly flew in and out of. She was also trying to suppress her Mana enough that her swarm was, while visible, small enough to not be too intimidating.

Part of this was that Skitter didn’t know if there were other players backing up these knights, and if there were, it would be a bad idea to show off her identity as the Hive Queen, Who Could [Skeletonize] a Player In Thirty Seconds Flat. That reputation had led to her getting attacked while she was out grinding by people who thought she was a raid boss. Far easier to blend in, adapt to the local power structure, and attempt to build a reputation on skill and wit instead of pure strength.

That was another thing Jack Slash had excelled at. He was outclassed in pretty much any one-on-one fight, but between his reputation, his silver tongue, and his cleverness, he managed to outmaneuver his opponents and eke out victories, which made him seem more impressive. After all, if enemies know that you’re stronger than them, they’ll band up, get clever, and take you down. If enemies know they’re stronger than you and you’ll probably win anyway? Then they’ll stay away.

* * *

Enri Emmot cowered over her sister Nemu, cradling her broken hand. This was it, the last thing she could do to save her sister was to shield her with her body. Her back was lanced through with pain, she could feel her blood soaking into her shirt, tears welling in the corners of her eyes. Behind her, she could hear the knight’s armor jingle as he held his sword up.

“Not so tough now, you little bitch.” The knight growled. Enri closed her eyes-

There was a sharp crack, and Enri’s eyes shot open. She turned, and saw the knight that was about to kill her had been thrown clear of the road and crashed bodily into a tree. He wasn’t moving. Then, Enri’s savior stepped from the other side of the road, out of the bushes. A woman, with smooth, dark skin and eyes that would be beautiful if they didn’t look so  _ angry _ , wielding a massive crossbow, and dressed in strange, dark green clothes. She raised her crossbow to point at the second knight, who was still staring at the body of his fallen comrade in shock. A flash of green light, and the crossbow was reloaded with what looked like a bundle of normal-sized arrows.

“Drop your weapon.” She growled.

The knight yelled something angry and incoherent, starting to raise his weapon, and the woman didn’t hesitate for an instant. Her crossbow fired, and the bundled arrows became a conical cloud of shrapnel, bodily blasting the knight backwards with another sharp crack. The knight tumbled in the dust, head over heels, then lay still.

Then the woman turned back to her, and Enri saw that her eyes had softened. “Are you two alright?”

Enri couldn’t hold it back. Ignoring the pain in her hand, she clutched the woman’s legs and sobbed in relief, staining her red, white, and blue sash with tears.

* * *

Skitter terminated Miss Militia’s call.  _ Okay, these knights are probably between levels 15 and 20, and that means they probably have a higher leveled leader as well. I can’t go and fight them too much in melee, I look like a spellcaster and should probably play the part better. I do have Dragon to help, though. I need to limit myself to tier 3 and below spells, as well. If I need a more powerful spell, I’ll need to make sure it has a subtle effect and can be cast silently. Dragon’s fast, even in her low-tier equipment, so I can probably get her to rush around protecting any civilians still in trouble while I try to fight the knights head-on. _

“Dragon, try not to reveal any particularly strong or flashy abilities. We’re trying to look like we’re around level 20 in order to prevent any strong opposition before we know exactly what we’re dealing with in this world.”

“Confirmed.” Dragon’s voice was all business. None of the pleasant tones of her relatively human appearance in the Crypt. 

And with that, Skitter and Dragon burst into the village. Nobody in the immediate area. Skitter checked her passive ability, [Swarm Sense], and began bolting to the square. It seemed as though the knights had rounded up the survivors there, and were planning to execute them en masse. The dirt road flashed by under her as she ran.  _ Just a little further. I need to get there in time. _

Skitter saw a knight turn her way to react as she dashed out into the square. Spinning, she cast a quick [Lesser Attack Order] at the luckless knight, then kept moving, yelling out, “Dragon, protect the townspeople!” She then ducked under a sword strike as someone yelled out, “Adventurers!”

Battle was joined. The knights began moving to attack them, and Skitter used strategic castings of [Web] to entrap them. From her staff, massive grey white globules flew, exploding into massive entangling masses of sticky and strong webbing. Dragon charged smoothly past her and carved through the massive spiderwebs containing the knights with her flaming sword, setting them ablaze.  _ Nonmagical fire doesn’t deal much damage, but it should help soften them up.  _ She could see one knight standing back from the rest, ordering the smoldering soldiers around, and Skitter grinned.  _ An obvious commander. Take him out, the rest of the battle goes far easier. _

While Dragon knocked soldiers to the ground with the flat of her blade, branding them with its heat, Skitter made a beeline for the commander. Knights moved to intercept her, and she was forced to dance around their blades for precious moments as the commander tried to coordinate efforts against Dragon. Skitter was forced to waste MP on the first tier spell [Silkstring]. Silken rope began spooling out of her staff, and she expertly dove in and out of the knights’ grasp, eventually leaving them all tied up together in a heap. Still, it had taken time, and the Knights had started to try delaying tactics on Dragon while some of their rearguard peppered the armored figure with bolts and arrows.

Without their commander to coordinate it, there was no way they’d be able to keep the tactic up. Skitter got into range of the man, and opened fire with [Lesser Attack Order]. The commander, worryingly, managed to carefully crush them with his shield and boots while continuing to shout out orders.  _ Damn. Better step up my game a little. _

Skitter cast [Bola], and a length of spider silk with a sticky blob on the end shot out of her staff. It hit the commander’s shield dead-on, and Skitter pulled sharply while retracting the silk back into her staff. The force yanked the commander forward sharply, sending him stumbling forwards and tearing the large steel shield from his grasp. Skitter spun, carefully controlling the length of the silk. The shield swung in a wide arc, and crashed bodily into the commander’s side. He dropped to the dirt, face-first, and Skitter dispelled [Bola].  _ Thank goodness I chose versatile low-level spells. Damage isn’t all that determines a spell’s worth. _

Commander down, Skitter went after the ranged attackers, who began firing at her instead of Dragon. A mistake, as it gave Dragon an opportunity to go after the knights in melee with her in earnest instead of avoiding the ranged attacks. With no leader, Skitter and Dragon made short work of the attackers. Some had probably fled in the heat of battle, but hopefully not much would come of that.

That done, Skitter turned to the huddled masses of villagers. A quick [Message] to Miss Militia to bring in the rescued girls, and she was ready to speak. Before she could, though, she felt a sharp impact on the back of her head. “Lady Skitter, don’t go rushing out there alone. You could have been hurt!”

_ Well there goes any chance of putting up a good villainous front. _ Skitter thought, even as she rubbed where Dragon had hit her. It seemed to put the villagers a little more at ease though, and they started standing and moving around, going to check on their homes and find their loved ones. One person approached Skitter and Dragon, presumably the chief of the village.  _ Chief? Mayor? Ruler? Organizer?  _ His body bore the signs of long hours spent working out in the sun, and his face was old, drawn, and tired.

“Thank you for coming to our village, brave adventurers. I’m afraid we don’t have much to reward you with, but-”

Skitter cut him off with a gesture. “Please, think nothing of it. We were simply traveling, heard fighting, and decided to help. However, we don’t know much about these lands, and would appreciate more information. May we accompany you to your home and ask you a few questions?”

The chief nodded, relieved they weren’t asking for money, and Skitter beckoned Dragon to come with. She could see Miss Militia approaching the square with the two girls, talking to them about something, and sent a quick [Message] to her to keep her informed.

The meeting for information went smoothly, the chief answering their questions politely to the best of his ability. Sadly, he didn’t know much about how powerful people were outside of the village, beyond that there were powerful people, including some warrior named Gazef who seemed to police the kingdom. Plans of action and investigation were buzzing in her head. She resolved to visit the nearest city, E-Rantel, quickly in order to gather more information. They probably had brokers here too, after all. Perhaps the village chief here would be willing to vouch for her to the local adventurer’s guild?

Then the chief was called off to help with funeral rites for the dead, and Skitter was left alone with her thoughts, wandering the town. Resurrecting the dead was out of the question, no way was she going to put a target on her head when it was absolutely possible it wouldn’t even work. The villagers were probably under level 5 after all. It didn’t stop her from feeling guilty about it, but she had at least saved the rest of them. That had to count for something with her conscience, right?

Skitter wandered through the empty streets of the town, lost in thought. Dragon walked with her, silent for the time being. Shaking her head, she thrust her guilty thoughts from her mind and decided she would sleep in the village for the night, then set out for E-Rantel in the morning. The Crypt was hidden; it could run on a skeleton crew for the time being while she head the guardians work on gathering information. Harbinger could probably handle the day-to-day affairs on his own. Although, she should probably try to rotate who was stuck back at base, make sure nobody went stir-crazy.

A [Message] from Miss Militia came in. She could see a large group of warriors on horseback approaching the village with her [Eagle Eye] skill, and was moving to warn the villagers. Skitter nodded, plans put aside for now. She wasn’t just going to leave this village to fend for themselves.

Skitter and Dragon stood at the entrance of the village, watching as the riders approached. Behind him, he heard footsteps, and saw Miss Militia and the village chief approaching. Skitter nodded, trusting that Miss Militia would keep the man safe if these riders attacked outright, and turned back to face the road.

The warriors, clad in a mismatched assortment of armor and weapons, rode to a stop in front of the village. One man rode a little further from the rest, a battle-hardened warrior brimming with confidence. He spoke, and his voice boomed, “I am the Warrior-Captain of the Re-Estize Kingdom, Gazef Stronoff. By order of the King, I have been visiting each of the frontier villages to exterminate knights from the enemy countries who have been making trouble here.”

Skitter could hear the village chief sigh in relief. Skitter herself gave the man a little bow, before saying, “Greetings. I am the adventurer Skitter. This village was indeed attacked by knights recently, but I managed to fend them off and capture a good number of them.”

Gazef dismounted and returned her bow. “Thank you for saving this village. I have no words that can adequately praise your kindness.”

“Please, it was not my sole effort. Dragon and Miss Militia here both played vital roles as well.” Gazef bowed to each of them in turn as well. “Will you be taking the captives?”

“That would probably be for the best.” Gazef looked pointedly at each of the adventurers’ chests in front of him, then asked, “I have not heard your names before, despite how strong you must be to fight off that many knights.”

_ Crap, hopefully that wasn’t too impressive.  _ “We are travelers, only recently arrived. It would be cruel to leave innocent people to a cruel fate like that, so we stepped in. It’s our duty as adventurers, after all.”

Gazef gave her a strange look. “Most adventurers value money above all else. I’m surprised that you’d step in without looking for recompense.”

_ Adventurers here sound terrible.  _ “The adventurers where we come from value helping people above monetary gain.”  _ Well, they take quests to help people, usually. Only hardcore roleplayers would really care about NPCs, but things are real now. _

Gazef smiled a little at that. “Well, maybe you can be a good role model for our adventurers. We should go take a look at your prisoners.” 

Skitter nodded and began to turn, when Miss Militia caught her shoulder. Skitter turned to see Miss Militia pointing out past the group of warriors, to a small group of individuals in plain clothes approaching their position. They were moving stealthily through the grass in the dusk, but Miss Militia had managed to spot them. Gazef and his men turned to look as well, and in response, glowing figures began to emerge from the grass, moving to hover above the figures. “Angels,” whispered Gazef, and he gripped his sword.

Skitter watched as he mounted his horse. A look of steely determination gleamed in his eye, but even so, he turned away from his foe to look at Skitter. “Skitter, would you and your adventurers be willing to aid us in defense of this village against those barbarians of the Slane Theocracy?”

“How could I refuse?” Her two Guardians moved to either side of her, brandishing their weapons. Skitter waved her staff, casting the spell [Conjure Lesser Steed] three times, and soon Skitter, Dragon, and Miss Militia were riding along with the rest of the warriors on three giant spiders. Some of the warriors had, for some reason, decided to ride a bit further away from them.

Ahead of them, more angels appeared as more individuals in plainclothes began emerging from out of the grass.  _ This is not a good plan. We’re charging straight in, and these are clearly casters with plenty of fodder to throw at us. They’ll pick us apart at range before we get close. _

Skitter blinked, and switched fully into PvP mode. “Miss Militia! Fall back, switch to a longer range weapon, and start trying to take them down. Dragon, feel free to give these guys a taste of your morning breath! Gazef, I’m going to try to lock down their angels and give you and your men a path to the casters! Watch for it!” 

With that, she stood on the back of her running spider, let the cloud of bugs around her out a little more, and waited until she saw the enemy casters begin casting. Globules of [Web] burst out from her staff, one after another, gumming up the wings of the angels, anchoring them to the ground. They struggled and strained, but Skitter knew they’d have a hard time breaking free. She had so many passive bonuses to her insect spells that there was no way angels of that level could break out within a minute. 

Better yet, the webs blocked line of sight to most of the enemy casters, meaning they couldn’t aim their spells at Skitter’s party. Gazef, Dragon, and Gazef’s warriors charged down the corridor through the sticky webbing she had left them, and behind her she heard a sharp crack as the weapon Miss Militia had swapped to pierced the webbing and received a sharp scream in response. [Eagle Eye] let her target enemies through cover, and she could use even the weakest weapons in her huge inventory effectively. Skitter, of course, had [Swarm Sense] to tell her what was going on through the webbing.

And what was going on there was chaos. Dragon was cleaving through them with frightening speed, having correctly interpreted Skitter’s command to be carte blanche to use lethal force so long as she wasn’t too extravagant. Gazef was also doing a fine job of cutting down casters. His men were having a tougher time of it. Dragon had a magic sword and breath attacks, and Gazef was doing...something to negate magical damage reduction, but the rank and file were having a much tougher time taking them down and were getting slammed hard with attacking spells in return.

At this rate, the angels were going to break free from the [Web] before their casters could be taken down and the monsters dispelled. Before she could apply a proper debuff, though, she noticed something. Another angel had risen up behind the attacking forces while her line of sight had been blocked by the [Web]. According to her [Swarm Sense], it was a Principality Observation, an angel with a level in the low 20s that provided a passive defensive buff to its allies so long as it floated there, still. That needed to go.

Skitter commanded her mount to climb up and over the [Web], giving her a view of the whole battlefield, and of all the angels approaching from the sides that hadn’t been webbed. _Damn, there must be dozens of the things._ _Still, Miss Militia and Dragon are doing a fine job on the grunts, I’ve just got to focus on the buffer._ With that thought, she cast [Magic Sting] on the massive angel, sending five large stingers flying through the air towards it. Then, she cast [Bola], sticking the angel and drawing it forward into to the attack, damaging it more and breaking its buff effect by forcing it to move.

An angry voice called for the angel to attack, and Skitter rode along the tops of the webs as it flew towards her. As her spider ran, she turned and cast [Bola] once more, except this time, she leapt off the spider as it stuck, and she swung around the angel, reeling herself in as she went. Both feet landed on the angel’s back, as the thing sluggishly tried to swing at her. It couldn’t get a good angle, though, and Skitter laid her staff alongside the angel’s head, before casting [Lesser Infestation]. 

The angel began convulsing, and Skitter leapt off, using the skill [Spiderclimb] to freely run on the top of the [Web] as behind her the angel succumbed to the Damage Over Time of the spell. It burst into a cloud of huge, writhing maggots that fell among the spellcasters and began to lazily attack them. Skitter smiled. It was a low level spell, but it was powerful because it required the spellcaster to touch the target, and would pierce through defenses. The maggots fell quickly, but they provided enough of a distraction for Dragon to close with that group of spellcasters.

Skitter, meanwhile, locked eyes with the man who had been ordering Principality Observation around. A quick check on Gazef and his men-mostly dismounted but still fighting, and winning now that the spellcasters didn’t have the defensive boost-she leapt off and made her way towards that man.

“You damned adventurer, killing Principality Observation! The Sunlight Scripture will see your head roll along with that of Gazef!” He lashed out with spells, and Skitter did her best to dodge out of the way. No point in revealing her immunity to low-level magic.

The man’s face was screwed up in anger as he failed to hit Skitter, and then it resolved itself into an expression of cruelty. “Very well. If you won’t fall to my spells, perhaps you would appreciate a greater opponent. Something strong enough to kill a Demon God!”

Skitter stopped in her tracks as the man drew a crystal from his cloak and raised it to the sky. _Strong enough to kill a Demon God, whatever that is? That sounds bad._ _Everyone else is still occupied with the spellcasters, shit shit shit. If that’s a Seraph, I might not be able to handle it alone, even at full strength. I might need to call in reinforcements._ The man, a maniacal grin plastered onto his face, yelled, “Fear the might which I, Nigun, will bring to bear on your puny adventuring party! I have deemed you worthy of being smote by the greatest angel the Slane Theocracy can bring to bear!”

With that, the crystal shattered, and a holy light roared into the sky. Descending from above; a massive winged shape, bathing the landscape in a blue-white light. The spellcasters cheered, and Gazef and his men looked on in awe. Miss Militia and Dragon, however, barely gave it a second glance.

“Dominion Authority! Smite her!”

_ Okay, not as bad as I’d thought, but it’s still level 50-ish. I’ll need to play my cards right to take it down without showing off my true strength. Also, shit, [Holy Smite]. I shouldn’t be able to survive that at the level I’m pretending to be, and it’s a hard one to dodge. Um... _

The angel’s tablet shattered and began to orbit around it, glowing brightly as it cast [Holy Smite]. Skitter, thinking fast, cast the first level spell [Cocoon], surrounding her in a weak silken shield. Nigun laughed. “A defense like that won’t save you!” As the light of the angel evaporated the [Cocoon] around her. The spellcasters cheered at her obliteration, but then they saw her silhouette was still standing, holding some sort of twisted, unholy shield over her head.

Skitter felt the damage from the attack, but seventh-tier magic wasn’t nearly enough to do significant damage to her. She still sold the effect, though. She staggered under the attack, dropping to one knee, and slowly dismissed her shield, letting it turn back into insects which were then immediately vaporized, making it look like the shield was slowly disintegrating. 

Skitter carefully timed it so that the shield vanished entirely as the attack ended, and she collapsed to her knees. The rest of the battle had paused, as the spellcasters and Gazef’s party looked on in awe that she had survived an attack like that. Miss Militia and Dragon, meanwhile, were mainly confused as to why she was acting like she’d taken heavy damage.

“What manner of item was that?” Demanded Nigun, pointing threateningly at Skitter. “Tell me, and I may spare your life.”

Skitter laughed. “That item was an Unholy Artefact, useful for making sure holy shit focuses on taking down it and not you. Luckily, someone back in my homeland decided fighting angels was something worth being prepared for.”

Nigun glared angrily. “There’s still no way you’ll be able to defeat Dominion Authority. It will be ready to smite you again soon, and then you will fall without your devilish shield.”

“I’m not going to give you the chance.” With that, Skitter, used [Bola] to launch herself up towards the angel, whose weapon was still reforming. She landed lightly atop its head, then blasted it with the third-tier [Stinging Cloud], point-blank. The angel and Skitter were hidden behind a thick black mass of bugs. A tense moment passed, as everyone watched to see what would happen.

Then, Skitter leapt out of the cloud, which dissipated a moment later, to reveal Dominion Authority, bleeding mana sparkles from hundreds of tiny wounds all along its form. However, its staff had reformed, and it seemed moments away from casting [Holy Smite] once more.

It didn’t, though, despite Nigun yelling for it to. And suddenly, everyone saw why; the angel’s head was thoroughly coated in a thick cocoon of spider silk. Skitter landed, and stumbled slightly, before addressing Nigun once more, “You know, funny thing. Monsters summoned by your own spells can be commanded mentally, but monsters summoned from spells in scrolls and the like? They need verbal commands. And Dominion Authority just so happens to be very easy to blind and deafen.”

Nigun just stared, his last order dying on his lips. Dominion Authority simply hung there, motionless, useless, like a statue. Before he could recover from his shock at seeing it so defeated, before he could even think of trying to get rid of the spider silk with a spell, Skitter simply walked up to him and whacked him in the head with her staff, and he went down like a sack of bricks.

Leader defeated, secret weapon hanging impotently in the sky, it was a simple matter to force a surrender from the rest of what Nigun had called the Sunlight Scripture.


	4. Chapter 4

Skitter took a look back at the long column of prisoners, watched over by the fourteen men Gazef had managed to see through the battle. She had to admit, it seemed strange that this Theocracy had sent this many people to attack what was, by all accounts, an undefended village. Had they been planning on getting attacked by adventurers, or encountering some larger defensive force? That didn’t explain their surprise at seeing herself or Miss Militia, though. Had they all come for Gazef? That didn’t make sense either, sending this many people to take down one person seemed excessive. Particularly when that person was a melee fighter. Ganking solo melee fighters was child’s play.  _ Although... _

Skitter rode her spider up alongside Gazef’s warhorse, which gave a little whinny despite its training.  _ Horses don’t like giant spiders. Who would have thought. _ Gazef turned to look at her.

“Thank you again for helping with the defense of that village. Without you, the situation would have been far more dire.”

Skitter gave him a little smile. “Think nothing of it. Good exercise.”

Gazef coughed, then turned to look at her incredulously. “Good exercise? You charged an angel that killed a Demon God and took it down, single-handedly! If you’re going to register at the adventurer’s guild, I’m sure you’ve more than earned Adamantine rank.” He shook his head, then stared wistfully off into the distance. “I hope I can be as strong as you and your party were, some day.”

Skitter bopped him in the back of the head with her staff. Gazef turned to look at her, hand on his sword. “Wha-”

Skitter gave him a flat look. “Gazef, what I used there wasn’t strength. I thought you, as the great warrior of Re-Estize, would realize that. I used  _ strategy. _ I controlled the battlefield, the terms of engagement, made sure we were fighting on our terms and not theirs. I knew I had an item that would eat a lethal hit for me, so I could fight a little more recklessly. I hid the fight with Dominion Authority so his commander wouldn’t realize it could attack again until after I had deafened it.”

Gazef blinked. “Your spells, though. They were-”

“They were third tier or lower, just like theirs were. I just taught myself spells that were versatile, that could be used on enemies regardless of their strength. Trying to overpower an opponent is a fool’s game. They kept casting spells to try and damage or debuff, putting the ball in our court to resist or reflect them. The beauty of my insect spells? They make material objects, which lets me use them for far more things than some silly beam of light.”

Gazef turned and thought for a moment, and Skitter took the opportunity to try and change the direction of the conversation. “That’s not to say that you weren’t doing great as well, out there. Dragon said you kept using techniques she’d never seen before.”

“You mean my [Sixfold Slash of Light]? It’s a Martial Art I developed myself, actually.”

“Martial Art?”

Gazef turned to look at Skitter once more. “You don’t know what Martial Arts are?”

“Where I come from, we don’t have them. What are they?”

“They are abilities earned through intense training and allow warriors to fight on a higher level.”  _ So they’re learned skills. It sounds almost like a melee spell, of sorts. I wonder if the NPCs of the Crypt can learn them. _

Gazef interrupted her train of thought. “Still, I have to ask, what was this country you came from like, that it produced warriors like yourself and Dragon? I’ve never seen armor like hers, and you fight unlike any magic caster I’ve ever known.”

Skitter sighed.  _ Well, time to pull out the big guns. Story time. _ “Let me tell you a story. Back in my homeland, I used to think that being strong was everything. The thing about that was; I wasn’t strong. People stronger than me would walk all over me, would kick me into the dirt, and I thought there was nothing I could do about it.

“Then I met someone who let me into their group. It was small, only four people at the time, but they were tight knit. Thing was, they were weak, too. None of them could really fight, one was even an explicit noncombatant. But they  _ won _ , even when they had no right to, because they had never thought strength was the way to win. They would spread darkness over the battlefield, use minions to shepherd enemies, use well-timed debuffs which had little effect but couldn’t be resisted, and their noncombatant would coordinate them and taunt the opponents into making mistakes.

“And it worked, beautifully. We would fight enemies far stronger than us, but because we chose our battlefields, and because we played our cards right, we’d win anyway.”

Gazef quietly asked, “What happened to them?” and Skitter found herself unable to speak for a moment. She looked away for a moment, blinking back tears.  _ They’re gone now, _ She didn’t say.  _ They abandoned me,  _ she didn’t say.  _ They left me behind,  _ she didn’t say. By the time she was ready to say something, Gazef had already ridden on. Taylor took one more look at the prisoners, who were kind of blurry now for some reason, and continued riding in silence.

Sitting in a tent with Dragon, the column having made camp for the night, Skitter pushed Taylor aside and began thinking about business. This world had many, many new leads to follow. Adamantite ranked adventuring teams, the Slane Theocracy, Martial Arts, what kind of potential the natives of this world had. Miss Militia, being the proactive kind of person she was, had already requested that she and the Wards be stationed in Carne Village in order to train the inhabitants to defend themselves. Skitter had readily accepted the request. It was a good opportunity to see how strong the villagers could become. It would also give the Wards a chance to get out of the Crypt without straying dangerously far away.

Also, Miss Militia had taken a shine to that girl she’d saved, and Skitter wasn’t really willing to separate them. Miss Militia had hinted that those girls had lost their parents in the fighting, and she was almost certain Miss Militia’s backstory had specified that she was an orphan, too, so there was probably some empathy going on there. Seeing that the NPCs could take initiative and make good decisions cheered Skitter up significantly.

With that in mind, and given how well saving that village had gone, Skitter was fully prepared to give the rest of her Guardians some tasks. Keep them busy, keep them working, but give them plenty of autonomy. Good guildmaster habits, seeing use again after being so long unused.

Charlotte struggled futilely against the leather bindings keeping her lashed to the table. Her tongue beat against the gag, trying to force it out of the way so she could scream for help. Unlikely though it might be to come. She hoped against hope that a miracle would break her out of this nightmare.

But the little girl seemed totally unworried. The thrice-damned little girl, who had been sobbing by the side of the road. The little girl who she just  _ had _ to try and help out. The little girl who she made the little group of travelers she was with stop for. The little girl sobbing fake tears over the dead dog-that-wasn’t-a-dog that had leapt from her arms as soon as she got close and started killing the other travelers making their way to E-Rantel.

The little girl currently whistling a cheery tune as she played a cute little game of eenie meenie miney moe over a selection of cruel-looking surgical implements. The little girl who had donned some twisted mockery of a cleric’s robe, stained with the blood of other victims like Charlotte was bound to become.

That was sufficient motivation to spark a new round of struggle.  _ Damn damn damn damn damn!  _ The girl seemed to notice, and Charlotte froze. She couldn’t look away from the girl’s glassy, empty eyes as she approached the operating table with bouncy steps.

“Oh come on, come on, why are you so scared? I’m not going to kill you.” She said sweetly. Charlotte didn’t buy it for a second. “I’m just going to turn you into a beautiful piece of art!” She clapped her hands. “Big sis is so  _ worried _ about everyone, and she really needs something to help her cheer up, and she really, really likes seeing us happy, and that’s where you come in!” The little girl ran an ice-cold finger along Charlotte’s face, and she shivered despite herself.

“See, big sis made this adorable giant bug-man to guard the treasury! But he’s so lonely, up there among all the shiny things, nothing to do. So I thought, ‘Hey Bonesaw, you can make him happy, and make Skitter happy too, and then she’ll say ‘Oh my god you’re the best little sister ever’ and everything will be great!” Charlotte’s eyes remained glued to the insane monster in the probably stolen guise of a little girl. “So I’m going to make you into Atlas’ wife! You’ll be so pretty! I’ll have to take out your skeleton, of course, because bugs don’t have skeletons on the  _ insides _ , that would be silly, but I’ll give you a super-pretty exoskeleton, and you’ll have long, flowing antenna hair, and you’ll get to have way more joints in your arms and legs, and you’ll be so thin and it’s going to be love at first sight!” The monster-girl gave a little squee, and Charlotte shuddered.

The monster-girl wandered away, and carefully selected a wicked-looking scalpel. “Okay, I’m gonna get started now. Get those pesky bones out.” Charlotte closed her eyes, tears leaking out of the corners, wishing, hoping, praying that this was some sort of insane nightmare. She could feel the steel press against her arm, feel it slide in with a spike of pain, and then-

It was gone. Charlotte’s eyes shot open, only to see the monster-girl with her hand up to her ear, talking to someone who wasn’t visible.

“Yeah, big sis, that sounds super fun! I’ll get on that right away!”

“What? Aw, okay. It’ll still be fun, though. I can use whatever I want so long as they’re okay afterwards, right?”

“Yay! Okay, okay, I’ll get started right away, just let me finish something up here.”

“What? No! No, I wouldn’t-”

“Okay, okay. Love you, big sis. Bye!”

The monster girl turned back to Charlotte. “Well, a little bit of bad news. Big sis gave me a very important job, so I’m not going to have the time to fix you up right away. I promise I’ll do it when I get back. I’ll have a Custodian take care of you until then. Bye!” She skipped out of the room, leaving Charlotte alone.

Charlotte whimpered.

* * *

Lung gingerly flipped a page in his book with one claw, leaning back lazily in his throne on the fifth floor. His subordinates patrolled the floor, watching for threats, but he knew that attackers would have to pass through Bonesaw’s territory first. Plenty of advance warning.

He turned another page. Being a Guardian was a fairly relaxed lifestyle. Lots of time spent waiting and relaxing, a little bit of time spent fighting. Some of those fights angered him, but it was a cold anger, tempered by the knowledge that the foes who had beaten him were slaughtered in turn by his allies on the floors above.

He turned another page. Lung was a proud man, yes. If he’d had the strength, he could have seen himself placing himself in a position like Skitter’s. But for all the strength his Creator had given him, he knew that he didn’t have the right kind of strength. He was powerful, and he had good instincts in a fight, but he couldn’t  _ lead. _ Not like he’s seen Skitter do it.

His was a world where single powerhouses were regularly taken down by teams of less powerful foes. And Lung knew, he would always be the singular powerhouse of his floor. All his subordinates were defensive, designed to delay attackers as he built up his strength, but none of them really had any offensive abilities worth taking note of. If he wanted to approach the sort of strength Skitter had, he had to learn to truly lead. To coordinate, to stay cool and calculated in battle.

Maybe that wasn’t who he was. But that hardly mattered. He would grow, and learn, and  _ become _ that kind of strong person. And then he would be able to talk to Skitter like an equal, without his clear inferiority hanging over his head. He breathed out a small gout of steam.

He turned another page in  _ Contessa’s Path to PvP. _ No-nonsense tactics, straight from his Creator. He’d been paging through every book on PvP, on leadership, and on tactics that he could find in the Crypt’s library. Even the ones by Glaistig Uaine, which were wrapped up in so many layers of weird linguistic bullshit that it made his head spin. All part of growing stronger.

A [Message] came in for him from Skitter, and he dog-eared the page he was on, set the book down, and answered.

“Lung. I have a job for you.”

* * *

“We’re gonna be detectives, Elle!”

“Do we really need the hats?”

Elle’s voice sounded exasperated, but Mimi knew she was smiling. “Of course we need the hats! They’re even color coordinated, see?” Mimi held up two floppy hats in the style of Sherlock Holmes, one in a fiery red and the other in a forest green.

“Where did you even find color coordinated detective hats?”

“The Dollhouse. Duh. Have you  _ seen _ how much stuff Parian made? We could wear a different outfit every day and the sun would blow up before we had to repeat.”

“How long is it gonna take the sun to blow up?”

“Two, three weeks, maybe? Basically forever.”

Elle giggled and threw a pillow at Mimi. “C’mon, we have to get ready!”

“Oh, like it’s gonna be that hard. We’ll probably just waltz into town and be all, ‘Aargh tell us everything,’ and they’ll be like, ‘Oh please don’t hurt us you scary and also pretty women, we’ll talk,’ and then Skitter will give us, like, a new board game or something.”

“Oh come on, you love Monopoly.”

“Doesn’t mean I don’t want a new board game that Harbinger can’t cheat at.”

“Harbinger can cheat at any board game!”

“Well then, a board game we can cheat better than Harbinger at.”

Elle giggled again, and put on the long duster and picked up the bubble-pipe. Burnscar followed suit, and soon they were standing back-to-back, looking very detective-ish in the mirror.

“Alright, I think we’re ready. Time to go track down some bandits!”

* * *

Harbinger wasn’t in his office. Instead, the Custodian who was his assistant floated about industriously. Harbinger had left her many, many pages worth of notes pertaining to the maintenance of the Crypt, and a signed note granting her temporary authority to carry out those tasks. The problem was, she was a Custodian! She couldn’t just walk up to Atlas in the treasury and ask for money. 

Well, provide a note detailing the proper amount of money that would need to be transferred various places, but the sentiment still stood. Even working on Harbinger’s authority, it wasn’t something she wanted to get wrapped up in. Not that she had a choice. She was a Custodian. It was her job to follow orders, clean things, carry things from place to place, maybe.

But Harbinger had said that so long as she followed his timetable, clearly labeled on his desk, and delivered the notes in the order they were stacked on his desk next to the timetable, and reviewed the information in the third, much larger stack next to  _ that _ , that everything would be fine.

And he probably wouldn’t even be gone for the three weeks that he had laid out timetables for and he wasn’t even leaving the building he just needed to be alone in the scrying room and  _ everything was going to be fine. _

The Custodian breathed. And checked the timetable. Eight minutes to the next note delivery. She could do this. She was a professional. She’d been working for Harbinger for  _ years _ . Just because this was probably the most power a level one  _ anything _ had held in the Crypt was absolutely unimportant. The fact that if she screwed up Harbinger would probably request to have her transferred to Bonesaw’s floor where the other seventh floor Custodians told her that those Custodians went around with bloody facemasks and giggled all the time and whispered about doing terrible things to anyone who didn’t  _ belong _ and  _ stoppit stoppit stoppit I can do this I can do this. _

Harbinger’s job had better be really important. Or else she was going to  _ on purpose  _ forget to dust on top of his bookcases. Maybe. If she was really really mad and absolutely sure that she wouldn’t actually get in trouble for it. The Custodian picked up the next note and began to make her way through the Crypt.

* * *

Miss Militia sat on a hill overlooking the little village, longbow at her side. A peaceful, sleepy little place. Idyllic, if it weren’t for the fact that it had the bad luck to get attacked by knights from a rival kingdom. 

It was nice, to be able to have a direct hand in protecting something. She’d been cooped up in that Crypt for far too long. When she brought the Wards down here, under some pretense or other, they’d probably like being able to act, too. There was plenty to do. A wall around the town might be nice, for one. And of course there were plenty of damages to repair. Some proper watchtowers couldn’t hurt. So much to do.

But most important was making sure the village was safe. Miss Militia settled in for a long night of keeping watch.


	5. Chapter 5

People’s heads turned as they passed.

“Are they adventurers?”

“They look so young.”

“Only two of them?”

Elle groaned. Even with illusion magic, there was just no hiding Mimi. This mission was supposed to be secret! And yet Mimi wanted to just skip down the street in broad daylight, and damn the hypothetical people who might be able to see through illusions. So here Elle was, trying to concentrate on making sure they had at least four layers of illusory magic around them at all times, making them look relatively normal, and for all the enthusiasm Mimi had for this mission she’d already wasted an hour window-shopping in the market square.

There was just no helping that girl.

At this rate they were never going to find someone who could use Martial Arts. Not that Mimi had worried much about it beyond saying, “Well, I’m sure we’ll think of something.” Elle had made sure to find out about who they might be looking for, and that they’d probably be at a place called an adventurer’s guild, and even where such a guild would be, but Mimi just wanted to look at all the pretty shiny things.

Well, time to try again to get Mimi back on track. Elle moved up to where she was carrying on a conversation with a random merchant and holding a shirt or something up to the light. As if they didn’t already have a billion varieties of clothes in the Dollhouse.

“Mimi!” She hissed, quietly enough nobody else would hear, “We really should be working on our mission.”

“But what if there are bandits hiding under one of these market stalls? I can’t just leave now, when they might be right under our noses.”

Elle gave her a flat look. “Mimi. Come on. Skitter gave us a really important job. We can come back to the market stalls later.”

Mimi looked at her feet. “Okay, okay. I guess we can look somewhere else.”

Elle grabbed her arm and began to lightly tug her away from the market. “Okay, great! And you aren’t going to get distracted. At all.” Elle put a stern expression on her face as she said it.

Mimi managed to look offended, and Elle laughed.

It only took Elle a moment to realize that she had no idea where she was going. She had no idea who she should ask about bandits or whatnot, and Skitter had pretty much just told them, “Find a Martial Arts user we can talk to, probably a bandit or something.” Who even knew about something like that?

“Elle. Do you even know where we’re going?”

“Shh. I’m thinking.”

“Let’s just ask someone.”

“No! This is secret! People can’t just know that we were-”

“Hey! Hey! Yeah, you! Hey, do you know where we can find some bandits, or anyone else that knows where we can find some?”

“You girls new here? Adventurer’s guild is over in that direction.” The man gestured in a general southeasterly direction with the hand that wasn’t carrying a large crate of fruit.

“See, Elle? I’m a great detective!”

“Wait, Mimi-”

* * *

Elle was sitting on a stool by the little bar in the adventurer’s guild while Mimi haggled with the woman at the counter about letting them know where they could find bandits even though they weren’t actually adventurers. The argument was getting a little heated.

_ Heh heh, Mimi’s getting heated. _

Elle took a sip of the glass of milk in front of her. She didn’t actually know, but she was pretty sure alcohol was bad for her. Faultline had said it once, that alcohol was bad for her. So it probably was. Faultline wouldn’t lie.

_ I wish Faultline was here. She’d probably already know where those bandits were. And then Newter and Spitfire and Gregor the Snail would all have gotten together but now Mimi and I could be in on the plan and it would be so cool and _ -

Someone snapped their fingers in front of her face, and she blinked. Elle saw a mountain of a man, with a bare, hairy chest, and a really, really big axe, staring down at her.

“Hey, uh, you okay? You started staring off into space for a little while there?”

Elle shrunk down into her glass of milk, in a metaphorical sense. _ I’m pretty sure that I can’t do it literally but I really really want to because this guy is big and scary and Skitter doesn’t wasn’t me to be suspicious meaning I can’t do anything to him if he- _

“C’mon, stay with me.” He snapped his fingers again. “Hey, I promise I don’t bite. Name’s Gerem.” He stuck out a meaty hand, and Elle gingerly shook it, still nervous. She tried to not lose focus again, though. 

“So, your friend over there doesn’t seem to happy about something. Care to share?”

“U-u-uh,” Elle didn’t know whether answering or not answering was more suspicious, but if they were detectives, then she could deduce it, right? If she was trying to be secret, that meant that she was trying to make sure nobody knew she was here. She definitely would never talk to this guy if she could help it. Therefore, to make people think she wasn’t here...

“Well, we want to find some, uh, bandits, and, um, we don’t really know where to look.”

Gerem laughed. “You girls seem a little young to be going after bandits.”

“B-b-but-”  _ Skitter gave us this job!  _ “-we have to do it, okay?”

“How come, did, uh, something happen?” His voice lowered a little as he asked that, and Elle thought he was embarrassed, maybe? She wasn’t a good enough detective to know for sure.

“Well, I don’t think so.”

“Well then, it’s not really a big deal. You and your frien...” Gerem trailed off, staring past Elle, and Elle saw Mimi’s hand was on fire and Mimi was looking  _ really, really mad- _

“Mimi! No!” Elle leapt, tackling her to the ground.

* * *

“I can’t believe you did that. She would totally have talked if I had burned her!”

“Mimi, burning is not what detectives do. It’s also not sneaky, and Skitter told us to be sneaky.”

“Detectives totally burn people! All the time! I’ll show you when we get back. I’ve got, like, fifty graphic novels where detectives burn people to find out where the criminals are.”

“You mean comics.”

“Graphic. Novels. Now where are we going to find more clues? You just got us kicked out of our only lead.”

“ _ I got us kicked out? _ You were gonna burn the poor counter girl!”

“She had it coming! She wouldn’t talk! Even when I said ‘ _ you better talk, or those criminal scum are gonna keep killing people and it’ll be on your head.’ _ in my best detective voice!”

“Okay, that was a good detective voice.”

“Right?”

“But still. No burning.”

“Aw, you’re no fun.”

“This is  _ important! _ ”

“I know, I know.” Mimi was pouting, though. Elle sighed. 

Then Mimi perked up. “I know where they’ll know where bandits are!”

“Where?”  _ We might still be able to do this! _

“Okay, think like a detective, right?”

“Right.”

“Now, we’re looking for bandits. Bandits live in hideouts, right?”

“Okay.”

“Well, in order to have a hideout, you have to be able to hide, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, who makes hide? A tanner!”

Elle blinked for a moment. “Mimi, I, uh, don’t know if that makes sense.”

Mimi sagged a little bit. “I know it doesn’t really make sense, but its all I could think of.”

“Well, we should go look anyway. Not like we have any better leads.”

* * *

They didn’t manage to find any tanners. According to the people they talked to, tanning was really smelly and gross and not a ‘city thing’. But they found a tailor with some leather stuff in his shop, and they’d tried asking him about bandits.

He got really angry really fast, though. He’d started yelling about how his clothes were all made here and all the materials were legally bought and whoever put you girls up to this was going to yada yada. It was annoying, and it left them totally without a clue as to what to do next.

“Elle?”

“Yeah?”

“I’m bored.”

“Me too.”

“Can we go back to the market?”

“Yeah. Sure. I could use a break.”

They wandered back, and soon Mimi was once again dancing around the stalls, looking at everything, picking up weird fruits and staring at them, looking at fancy clothes, shoving people into stalls and then apologizing profusely. Elle just sat in a corner by a nice old lady selling cheeses and closed her eyes, taking a moment to just sit back and think.

_ Mimi seems happy just moving around. She’s not really super into this job, I don’t think. She was really excited before. She got out the hats and stuff. Maybe she’s sad nobody can see them because I’ve got us disguised? I thought that was really so we’d feel more detectiveish ourselves. I definitely feel more detectiveish. I’ve made at least one deduction, and deductions are totally detectiveish things. _

_ I wonder if I can deduce something else? I don’t want to fail the job. That would be bad. No. I won’t fail. I won’t think about failing. Thinking about failing is bad. Deductions. Logic. Logiclogiclogiclogic- _

_ Come on, Elle, think! Okay, think like a bandit. Where would I be? A hideout. We already know that, that’s not helpful. Um. What would I do? I’d go and steal things. What things? Expensive things. Where would I steal them from? I’d steal them from people. Okay, but where? Outside the city. There’s too many angry people in armor inside the city to steal things from.  _

_ Where outside? The roads. Lots of people would pass through the roads. But not everyone has stuff worth stealing. How do you know who to steal from? You steal from the people who are rich. How do you know they’re rich? Um, they have horses? Carriages! Horses  _ and  _ carriages! But those only have people, and you can’t steal people. What if there was stuff in the carriage? Who would carry stuff in a carriage? _

_ Merchants! _

Elle leapt to her feet, and yelled out, “Miss! Miss!” until the old lady turned to look at her. “Miss! Have you been having bandit troubles recently?”

“Oh, yes dearie. However did you know?”

Elle proudly puffed out her chest and said, “I’m a detective!”

The old lady smiled, and started talking.

* * *

Burnscar had to admit, being a detective was far less glamorous than she would have liked.

When Skitter had said they were trying to track down a Martial Arts user who wouldn’t be missed while he was questioned, Burnscar had imagined sleuthing through the streets of some run-down city in the pouring rain. She’d pictured dramatic interrogations, using some flame manipulation skill to let flames lightly lick the face of some human scum, slowly turning up the heat until he talked. She’d pictured dramatically kicking in the door of some filthy bar in the bad part of this hypothetical town, asking after the powerful crime lord that had slipped through their grasp last time. She’d pictured a dramatic final confrontation, her and Labyrinth staring down some smug bastard who would draw a wicked looking sword and refuse to come quietly.

She, in short, had pictured this job being  _ awesome. _ Or at least involving some sort of combat. Instead, she and Labyrinth had spent all day  _ talking to people, _ and now they were sitting inside of a pair or hollow trees, watching a boring road in a boring stretch of country where absolutely nothing ever happened. And Labyrinth had even said they had to use their combat names now! They weren’t in combat! They were  _ waiting! _

For the fortieth time in as many minutes, Burnscar hissed to Labyrinth, “Are you  _ sure _ this is the road that old lady said the bandits have been sighted on?”

Labyrinth’s mumble of assent was starting to sound a little exasperated, but Burnscar was getting really, really impatient. There had to be a better way of being a detective than just  _ waiting _ . Clues, or something. Deducing the location. Neither of them was a Ranger, or a class with any sort of tracking ability whatsoever, but there had to be something. Labyrinth probably had, like, a billion and one spells to deal with this. Her whole deal was battlefield control, all she had to do was make a battlefield and control the bandits or whatever onto it. Was that so hard?

It was, of course, right then that Labyrinth whispered, “Someone’s coming,” and Burnscar let fire lick up her arms in anticipation.  _ Finally, action! Let’s see how they like a dose of- _

“Okay, good, they’re merchants. If we follow them, they might get hit by bandits, and then we can follow those bandits back to their hideout. Stay quiet.”

_ Might? _ Burnscar inwardly groaned. This was way too boring. “If this doesn’t work, I get to come up with the next plan.”

“Yeah, okay. That sounds good.”

“Seriously, I’m gonna hold you to-”

“Shh! Here they come! I’m gonna let us out.”

The trees around them shriveled down into the ground, and Burnscar stretched. “So, how are we gonna follow them without them noticing?”

Labyrinth walked over to her and gave a little smile. “I asked Harbinger to get us some Invisibility Rings from the treasury.”

Burnscar sagged a bit. “No elaborate plan based around making a tunnel under the road? Trying to make it so the road transmits sound so we can follow their hoofbeats? No letting them pass and then examining the aftermath of whatever happens and deducing where they went in a cool way?”

Labyrinth stuck out her tongue. “Nope. Here’s a ring.”

“You know, Labyrinth, for someone whose spells warp the very nature of reality to bring your imagination into being, your plans are really, really boring.”

“Just put on the ring. I’ll let you jump onto the cart, like those comic book heroes you like so much.”

“They’re  _ graphic novels,  _ Labyrinth. Totally different.”

* * *

The merchants didn’t even notice the light thump on the roof as they traveled. They were too busy watching for bandits. Not that their vigilance helped out when the bandits did come. Several were captured, more were killed, most of their goods were taken. There were just too many bandits for the few guards to handle.

Of course, the bandits weren’t keeping watch for anything at all. Nobody noticed two extra pairs of footprints moving with them. Nor did they notice when they got to their cave that the two sets of footprints had moved a little ways away from them to have an argument.

“Burnscar, we can’t just barge in!”

“Why not? We’re strong enough. We’re great fighters! They couldn’t possibly do anything to beat us.”

“Skitter told us to be discreet.”

“It’s still discreet if nobody gets away, right?”

“No! We need to talk to them.”

“They’re bandits, they aren’t just going to want to talk. We gotta fight ‘em.”

“What if some get away? That’s not discreet.”

“So we don’t let them get away.”

“It’s not that simple!”

“It totally is.”

“No! I am not letting you risk ruining all that detective work we did-”

“We asked people questions and sat inside trees for an hour! That’s not detective work! That’s just boring!”

“It was important!”

“I’m going to go fight them.”

“No, don’t-”

“I’ll hold back, don’t worry. And nobody’s gonna get away.”

“Burnscar,  _ please- _ ”

“Your plans are too boring. This’ll go fine, and you’ll have to admit it, and then we’ll do things my way on the next job.” Burnscar took off her ring and tossed it to Labyrinth, who fumbled with it for a moment, and when Labyrinth looked up next, there was just a scorch mark in the dirt where she’s been standing.

_ Oh no oh no oh no we’re gonna screw up the job and Skitter’s gonna get sad and she’s gonna leave us and then we’ll be all alone and then the other Guardians will all leave and then there’ll be nobody there at board game night and then Mimi’s going to leave me and I’ll be sitting in an empty room for the rest of my life and oh no oh no oh no Mimi where is Mimi is she okay she has to be okay she went in there alone and we don’t know who’s in there and they might be really strong I need to go save her c’mon move move mo- _

Labyrinth ran towards the entrance.

* * *

Brain cursed. He had been expecting a quiet evening. Some of the guys had gone out for an easy job, loot some merchants, kidnap a few, ransom ransom, the usual routine. He’d been looking forward to some poker, maybe a little fun later, nothing too serious.

Instead some insane demon lady had corralled the whole Death Spreading Brigade into a huge ring of fire. The stone floor of their base blazed merrily, somehow, because demons, and his men were all scared witless. Which was ridiculous. He was still here, after all, and he was stronger than all of them combined. All he needed was for this ridiculous demon to show her damn face again.

Not that he could see through the fire. Well, he could, but it would be a waste of [Field]’s perfect perception, and if she happened to be on the other side of the ring at the time, he would be out of luck. So he stood in the center of his men, confident. Better to bolster morale and go where he was needed. She might have blown through all their traps, but eighty men firing at her all at once while Brain kept her occupied would be more than enough.

For all that she was a demon, she still had flesh to cut. A demon in strange clothes. Brain had never seen clothes like that, but they wouldn’t protect against his sword.

Then, the flame at one end tilted and twisted, forming a window. The demon! Brain leapt forward only for tendrils of flame to lash out at him, forcing him to dodge. Slow tendrils, though. Didn’t even need [Field]. Easy. He just had to make sure his men didn’t panic and do something stupid.

So he boasted, instead. Key skill for a warrior. Flusters opponents, trips them up, makes it easier to make a mistake. Gazef had boasted before their battle, and he hadn’t, and he’d made a dumb mistake, and he’d lost.

He was still the stronger of the two of them, he knew.

“Little girl! Do you really think a little fire is going to keep us at bay? Fearsome in wartime and fearsome in peace, we do not fear you!”

Through the smoke, he could see the demon’s posture change. He’d struck a nerve. Clearly a demon used to terrorizing backwoods villages, not dealing with true warriors.

Except her words weren’t offended at all. In fact, they were callous, and a little cruel. “Foolish mortal. You think it is fear I desire from you? Nay, I desire to know; who among you is strong enough to face me? My master seeks true warriors!”

The flames cleared a little more around her, and Brain could see another, smaller flaming ring, that the demon stood inside.

“Single combat, that is what shall decide who may gain my master’s favor. And I say, nay, promise, that if you gain my master’s favor, you will emerge stronger in every way.”

Brain snorted. Typical. As if he would be dumb enough to fall for such an obvious-

“Of course, if you do not earn audience with my master, I shall immolate you where you stand.” Her flames roared like wild beasts to punctuate the remark, and Brain found himself suddenly very interested in this power she offered. He knew he was strong enough to earn it, but if he came back stronger? He could put Gazef in his place. Brain smirked. And, of course, he could always kill whoever this mysterious ‘Master’ of hers was, once he had the power.

Solid plan. Brain strode forth. “I will meet your challenge, demon! But I warn you, I will slay you, and I expect you to follow through on your bargain regardless.

She laughed, humorlessly. “A true Devil never breaks her word. She threw her strange jacket back, through the flames, and stood across from him. Behind him, the wall of flame closed up. His men wouldn’t be able to see him, but that hardly mattered. They would hear his victory. And then he would grow even  _ stronger.  _ Probably flame powers.

Brain’s hand went to his sword’s grip, and he sunk into a battle stance, in preparation for [God Flash]. If his bloodlessly quick blow did not fell her instantly, he knew it would nonetheless do heavy damage.

The moment she moved within three meters, [Field] would let him strike. And he wouldn’t miss.

* * *

Burnscar stood across from the blue-haired ruffian, unsure of what to do. She’s been desperately improvising the whole time, trying to lay down enough fire to hide her [Flamestep] skill, trying to make sure nobody fled out into the night, trying to make sure that she was discreet, like Skitter had wanted.

This was pretty discreet, she thought. All they knew was that there was a demon, and that demon had fire, and that was pretty much it. She’d even managed not to kill anyone. That had been hard.

Harder was figuring out what to do once she had them corralled. She was pretty sure fighting them all together would get too many of them killed, and she had no idea what Martial Arts looked like other than Dragon’s vague description of glowing swords and ‘melee spells’, whatever that meant. So she’d fight them one by one, and hopefully she’d notice when one of them used Martial Arts.

Except she had no idea how to convince them to fight one on one. Hell, she had no idea how to act like a flame spewing stereotypical demon. She was Burnscar! And also Mimi! And neither of them were very demonic at all. So she’d just tried to do what one of the villains in her graphic novels would have done. 

The idea to promise power was a stroke of genius, she thought. Villains promised power all the time. Skitter probably wanted Martial Arts people to serve as expendable guards while the true Guardians were out, anyway. At least according to her deductions. Which were still detectiveish deductions, because she was still wearing the hat.

The detective outfit was suitably demonic, since it was red, after all. No point in changing it, and this was way closer to what she’d imagined the detective work would be like, anyway. She’d thrown the jacket away dramatically, though. It was what Ash Beast would have done. Coolest. Villain. Ever.

Okay. Fighting. She figured she should probably try to be pretty soft on him until she knew what he could handle. Like, really soft. Dragon had said Skitter had only used third tier spells, which was crazy. Like, super crazy low. But a fight was a fight, even if it was the sort of fight where you had to pull your punches really, really hard.

_ Okay, we’ll start slow with a nice, easy, second tier spell and a slow punch, and work our way up from there, I guess? Um, let’s try using- _

Then a green form dove through her flame ring and yelled out “I won’t let you hurt Mimi!” 

_ Elle?  _ “Wait, Elle, it’s fine-”

The blue-haired swordsman looked very confused. Elle, staring at him for a moment, seemed to note that he wasn’t moving, and turned to Mimi.  _ Wait, fighting names! Fighting names! _

“Mimi, I’m so glad you’re okay! You ran off and I got really worried and-”

“Labyrinth! Fighting names!”

“Oh, right, uh, Burnscar. You’re okay, right? They didn’t hurt you? Everything’s okay?”

“Everything is under control, but, um, I was about to fight this guy, and you’re kinda in the way...”

“Oh! I’m so sorry, it’s just, I got really worried, and I had to make sure you were doing alright, and-”

“Labyrinth! Can you, um, make sure nobody got outside? I have this covered. Really.”

“Can you at least tell me what your plan is?”

“I’m kinda in the middle of it right now...”

“Oh. Yeah. Um. I’ll, just, uh, patrol outside. Sorry.”

Labyrinth slunk back through the flames, and Burnscar noticed that the blue-haired swordsman looked pretty lost. Burnscar decided to just try and play it off as well as she could. Well, as well as she thought Ash Beast could. Because she had to do what Ash Beast would do, it had gotten her this far.

“Sorry. You know how family is.”

“Was that your master...?” The man asked tentatively.

“No. Sister.” Burnscar gave a sheepish grin, then realized Ash Beast probably wouldn’t have grinned or said that, and she went into a fighting stance.

“Ahem, prepare to fight! Prove yourself, mortal warrior!”

She noted a little angrily that he looked more amused than scared, and she charged in.

Her spell was simple. [Brand]: easy, direct fire damage. She’d follow it up with a couple punches, and then she’d step back and see how well he took it. To her surprise, once she got close, he moved surprisingly fast. Like, way faster than a person who would be hurt by [Brand]. Burnscar changed tacks, moving to parry the blade with her tail and try for a knee.

The blade deflected easily, and she moved in, anticipating a dodge and preparing to her counter, but none came. In fact, he slowed down significantly, and Burnscar could briefly see a look of shock on his face before she hit him. He’d just barely shifted in time to avoid a fatal blow, but he still flew backwards, bounced off of the wall of flame with a sizzle, and landed on the stone floor of the cave, hard.

“Fuck!”

Burnscar moved to him. He was coughing up blood, but he wasn’t dead, at least. Just badly wounded. Shit. She was pretty sure that quick speed boost had to have been a Martial Art. Skitter was going to be so pissed, argh. She didn’t have any healing potions, she didn’t have [Message], she didn’t know anything about healing people, fuck!

Where was Bonesaw when you needed her?

She belatedly realized that she had to get him back to the Crypt as fast as possible before he died. No time to tell Labyrinth. She’d have Harbinger [Message] her to come back once she made it. Speed was key. If this guy died...

She blazed a trail straight out of the cave, as fast as she could. As she left the effective range for [Wall of Flame], she felt them go out. Hopefully those bandits wouldn’t be suspicious. They shouldn’t be. She was  _ discreet. _ Now she just had to  _ discreetly _ burn a fiery trail across the landscape before the guy died and Skitter got mad.

A flash of memory reminded Burnscar what an angry Skitter looked like.

She moved a little faster.

* * *

“So, Brain’s gone.”

“Should we, like, try to track that demon down to rescue him?”

“I doubt we’d have a chance in hell of beating her. She seemed really strong.”

“Yeah, but what’re we going to do without Brain? We won’t last past the first adventuring party with the balls to come after us.”

“First step, we reset the traps that demon bitch burned down. Then, we’ll think of something.”

“...Wait, is that her coat?”

* * *

Cedran of the Black Scripture stood at the ready as his comrades set up their camp and began to weave camouflage spells over it. His eyes restlessly flickered over the landscape, tinted red by the sunset, ever vigilant.

It would be his job to stop any attacks that happened while they were this vulnerable. Especially given what Thousand Leagues Astrologer had told them.

The Catastrophe Dragon Lord was going to re-awaken soon, after having been sealed away long enough for his fearsome name to pass into legend. Worse still, Thousand Leagues Astrologer had predicted that a fearsomely powerful being would be in this area in the near future.

And, of course, it was the Black Scripture’s job to deal with it. Specifically, poor Kaire, who had essentially sacrificed any hope of leading a normal life to instead master the incredibly powerful mind-control artefact she wore. Their one hope, really, to deal with the Catastrophe Dragon Lord, should he show up. Hope that mind control worked on him. The rest of them were just there to delay the beast while she used it.

Not that Cedran would trade his job for any other. The best way to protect his friends and allies, his God and kingdom, and even humanity as a whole was to be here, on the front lines, whenever they needed him. He was a shield, as literally as it could be said about anyone. He wielded  _ two _ shields, even, just to make sure that his defense was as impenetrable as it could be. Not that two shields of any amount of magical capacity would protect him from the dragon they were likely to face.

But he couldn’t be distracted, and he couldn’t be nervous. He had to be a stalwart bulwark. The first step to being a shield was to think like one. Shut out everything but getting between death and your wielder.

His eyes kept moving over the landscape. Unceasing vigilance. He could worry and be doubtful and let all that overtake him when he was tucked snugly into bed at home, in a few weeks.

But he couldn’t let himself hate away missions. Even in Re-Estize, which desperately needed the touch of his god. He had to be the shield.

* * *

Labyrinth was so,  _ so _ glad Burnscar had told her to go keep watch over the area. Her [Sense Life] spell had identified a suspicious group a little ways into the woods by the cave, and she had gone to investigate, as sneaky as she could be.

And watching from inside this tree? They looked dangerous. Maybe not as strong as her or Burnscar, but they looked dangerous, at least. And Skitter had told her to be careful. So she wouldn’t charge in.

Actually, this might be important enough to [Message] Skitter about. She hadn’t told them that she was looking for more dangerous people besides the one Burnscar was already handling just fine on her own, but Labyrinth had a feeling Skitter would want to know.

So she called, and waited for Skitter to pick up. And she had, eventually. Labyrinth knew Skitter was busy doing important leader things, though. So it was fine. Labyrinth told Skitter about the suspicious people setting up camp nearby.

Skitter, of course, told her to be cautious, but also to try to talk to them. Labyrinth almost made to walk over, but Skitter advised using an illusion and some [Creation] spells to make a proxy of some kind, so that if they were hostile they wouldn’t do anything bad to her.

Labyrinth thought that made a lot of sense. So she created an illusory branchy-person, someone Faultline had called a Dryad, and had [Minor Creation] lay down some interesting branches growing out of the ground where the Dryad walked. It was a good plan.

The suspicious people reacted badly to it, one with two really big shields yelling something out and moving to intercept it, and the people behind him dropped what they were doing and got ready to fight. She had the illusion raise its hands and created some illusory noise to go with the image.

“I don’t want to fight.”

Labyrinth then realized that Dryads probably didn’t talk like she talked. She had to talk like someone else. She settled on Nice Skitter, because Nice Skitter made her not want to fight things and hopefully it would do the same for the suspicious people.

“I just wanted to ask you why you’re here.”

The suspicious people were conferring with each other, and Labyrinth had to very, very subtly [Transmute] the air to make it carry sound easily to her.

“-don’t think it’s the one I saw. Still, better safe than sorry. Nature spirits don’t like people on their land, and killing them tends to make the land itself angry. We can’t afford something like that when facing the Catastrophe Dragon Lord, we need every advantage we can-”

Catastrophe Dragon Lord? That sounded bad. Labyrinth missed the rest of the exchange as she tried to imagine some kind of situation where this Catastrophe Dragon Lord would be super nice because she didn’t want to miss anything worrying about the Catastrophe Dragon Lord.

She realized one of them had started talking to the Dryad, and she forced herself to listen again. It was the pretty-faced one with the spear. His hair was nice. “-here to fight an immensely powerful foe who threatens the very world.”

Crap. That was definitely bad. “That sounds very bad. Would you like to talk about it?” Nice Skitter probably would listen to their problems, and then would say something nice and help them a little.

“Um. We aren’t sure exactly when this horrible beast will show up, or even that it would necessarily be here. We are ready to try and face it, though.”

“So, you’re really strong then? That’s very good. Being strong is good when you’re fighting bad things.” The suspicious people were sharing suspicious looks. Labyrinth tried to make her Dryad look more Dryad-y to make sure they didn’t think it was an illusion. She grew branches inside the illusion, so if they tried to touch it they’d feel something.

“Would you help us with fighting this beast?”

“Oh, of course!” Labyrinth then realized that Skitter, the real one, probably wouldn’t actually want her to fight this thing. “Except, uh, I don’t really know what you’re going to do. And the Law of the Forest says that I can’t help people who aren’t totally, uh, truly honest.”

They shared more suspicious glances with each other, and one of them said, “One of us is carrying an artefact-” before someone else elbowed that person, and then someone else else yelled, “We can’t just tell them that!” and someone else else else said, “You can’t trust nonhumans, you idiot!”

Aha! An excuse! “Well, if you can’t trust me, I guess I’m leaving, then!” She had the Dryad turn on her heel and stalk away, then let her dissipate. When the Dryad dissipated, Labyrinth stood and turned to leave. Skitter would be really happy to hear about-

“Over there!” A bolt of magic incinerated a tree next to her, and she yelped and took off as fast as her wings could carry her.

Oh no. Was she sneaky enough? They saw her. They actually saw her. Skitter was going to be really, really mad...

Then, she felt her [Life Sense] get in range of the road, and she stopped and sunk back down to the ground.  _ That’s a lot of people all moving away from the city... _


	6. Chapter 6

Night had fallen, and Bonesaw was  _ still  _ thinking.

Skitter had given her a job, and she had gone out to think, to figure out what she would do. The problem that had kept her from actually starting yet was a simple one.

She had too many ideas.

There were just too many ways she could do this! Should she try to make it as artistic as possible? Go for elegance? Speed was out of the question, given how long she’d spent already. Her mind whirled. Her last idea had been so straightforward, but now she was paralyzed with the possibilities.

So paralyzed, in fact, that she hadn’t even noticed the five figures making their way through the plain until they noticed her. Then she hadn’t really had a choice. Skitter had been very clear. Be discreet. Couldn’t really be discreet with five people running around yelling about a little girl in the middle of nowhere with blood on her robes.

She should probably figure out what they were doing here, first. It didn’t take long to get them subdued, a quick application of [Surgery: Targeted Paralysis]. High level, but very quick. Little more than a love tap to the neck, really.

They were all wearing armor, a hodgepodge of leather and metal. Bonesaw tsked. Proper adventurers should wear proper gear. Gear should say something about its wearer. Her robes did, for sure. It was part of art. Uncle Jack had said that, she was pretty sure.

None of them seemed very willing to talk much, either. Threats didn’t work. Uncle Jack had been good at those, but Bonesaw just couldn’t figure it out herself. Like why he was Uncle Jack when he was also sorta her dad. That was pretty weird.

She didn’t really want to waste a whole lot of time on these people, so she just went for a quick game of eenie meenie miney moe to pick one out, then hauled him into a sitting position. She had a Surgery just for this. [Surgery: Window to the Soul]. She carefully cut a hole in his forehead, right where the spooky diagrams that her lab was decorated with said the third eye was. Then she bored through the skull. Then, she pulled out another tool and stretched the hole wider and wider as the man screamed.

Way prettier than just scrying, that was for sure. She wound up with a portal about a meter in diameter centered in the whimpering man’s distended forehead, with the inside shrouded in fog. Time to learn things.

“So, what’re you guys all doing out here?” The man’s whimpering stopped, and his eyes glazed over. The fog resolved itself into an image, a mob of undead walking down the street of the city. 

The man began speaking in a stilted monotone. “We left the city of E-Rantel due to being too low-ranked to help with the undead horde in the city.”

“E-Rantel?”

The image resolved itself into a map, with two marks on it, one for where he thought he was, and one for E-Rantel.

“Who’s going to help?”

“Blue Rose.” The image resolved into a group of five women who looked like  _ proper _ adventurers. Their armor was visually interesting, drew the eye. Some of it seemed a little impractical, but Bonesaw could appreciate that. “They’re adamantine rank; the most powerful. They’re real heroes.”

Bonesaw grinned. A city full of undead, with the most powerful adventurers already moving in to deal with it? Someone was practically doing her job for her. She had to go thank them in person, critique their work, constructive criticism. It wouldn’t do to show up empty handed, though. She had to have a sample for her fellow artist to look at.

She pulled some more tools out. Time to get  _ creative. _

* * *

Bonesaw tsked as she looked at the state the city was in. Sure, the buildings were alright. Couple fires, broken windows, smashed doors, proper for something like this. But the zombies were all  _ wrong! _ They just meandered about aimlessly in the streets!

Bonesaw knew it was a subtle distinction, but there was an important difference between a city  _ of _ the dead and a city that just happened to have a lot of dead in it. She frowned. This was clearly the latter. The zombies weren’t great quality, either. It’d probably take her a really long time to fix this place up. She needed to talk to whoever started this; they needed serious help. And she had to think of a good way to delay the adventurers until she’d gotten this place in proper working order.

Sheesh. You’d think someone with the power to make this many zombies, even weak as they were, would do it  _ right. _ Have them stumbling through a cruel facsimile of their former lives, sadly stumbling about, half-remembering a past now forever closed to them. Or make them regimented, patrolling with uncanny vigilance, never ceasing motion, all moving together in lock-step. Have them hidden, moving only at the corners of people’s vision, sneaking up to corner them before the zombies had even made their presence known.

Philistines. Necromancy wasn’t some cast it and go affair. You had to do it  _ right. _

Like her zombies. She’d done a little bit of mix-and-match work between them; just enough to add some tasteful scarring and discolored skin patches, add an odd sense of asymmetry within each zombie individually, but also reflect the patterns of the zombie the skin had been switched with. Armor had been carefully reworked; she was no Parian, but she could at least do a good zombie. She’d very carefully made sure they were slowly leaking tears from their eyes, and every so often one would clutch its head or silently scream.

They weren’t actually sentient, they weren’t that strong. But it definitely gave the right idea. Not her best work, but enough. She was a little pressed for time. She couldn’t let Blue Rose get here before she was really ready, after all.

If there was one thing whoever this was had gotten right, it was that the zombies did, overall, move in a pattern. They spiralled outwards from a central point, specifically. Made it easy to find the artist in question. 

Bonesaw moved down the streets, noting the work that she would need to do as she went.

* * *

Khajiit had done it. He’d really done it. His zombie army had attacked, had destroyed E-Rantel, had turned into a true city of the dead. He’d gathered enough negative energy to complete his transformation, transcending the bonds of humanity. And he’d captured that annoying girl he’d been forced to work with, and was slowly, ever so slowly, letting her die. Not much, just enough to know how foolish it had been to egg him on.

Now, though, he was powerful. So, so powerful. He could feel the power in his chilled veins, suffusing his dry, grey skin, in the sunken recesses of his eyes. Power beyond his wildest dreams. Enough to crush any mortal foolish enough to cross his path.

He ran a loving hand over his Skeleton Dragon. He knew adventurers would be coming soon, but he couldn’t bring himself to care. The idea of him losing was foreign to him, now. He was so powerful, nothing could possibly beat him.

“Hello!”

A cheery voice echoed across the graveyard, and Khajiit turned, confused. An adventurer, already? He hadn’t sensed any unusual movements from his zombie horde, no fight had broken out, and yet here was a little girl standing next to a tombstone, five figures staggering along behind her.

Curiously, he noted that the hatred he felt for the weak, puny, fleshy mortals he had seen since he had adopted his new form was strangely absent when it came to the mysterious girl, and her five companions.

Some small part of him took note of the bloodstains on her cleric’s robe, and the anguished looks on the faces of the...not-people behind her, and filed away that he might need to feel some slight trepidation, possibly. Not fear, but perhaps a reasonable amount of caution would be advisable.

“Why do you intrude on my city of the dead?”

The girl gave him an exasperated look. “Okay, I’m going to come right out and say it, alright? Your art needs work. Yes, the graveyard is a classic, but you haven’t really made it  _ yours. _ It’s just a graveyard. And you yourself just look like a normal Lich. There’s no  _ oomph.  _ No wow factor. It’s sloppy, you know?”

Khajiit’s incredibly powerful new mind took distressingly long to parse the girl’s statements.

“Why have my undead not attacked you? Who are you? What do you mean by  _ oomph _ ?”

The girl smiled. It was cold, colder even than his heart was now. That was probably distressing. He should probably be feeling distress now. “See, any other night I’d go in detail, step by step, try to show you how to do this whole ‘Undead city’ thing right, but we don’t have a lot of time before the adventurers get here. So I’m just going to have to correct this myself, and I can go over my process with you afterwards.” The girl’s eyes tracked to Clementine’s not-quite-dead form, and her cold smile widened. “That’s a step in the right direction, though. Say, you mind if I use that? I have some ideas.”

Something about the way this girl said the word ‘ideas’ made Khajiit intellectually deduce that there should be a chill running down his spine. “What? No! No. You will cease trespassing here, or suffer the consequences.”

The girl gave a exasperated sigh. “Can’t you at least put some character into your threats? You’re like a cardboard cutout of an undead overlord. I hope you don’t mind me making a few edits. I promise you’ll keep plenty of your mind. I need something to teach, after all.”

Khajiit wasn’t going to take much more of this. Distantly, he was aware that fear was probably the appropriate response here, but he didn’t actually feel it himself. So instead, he drew up a spell. A simple [Fireball]. Effective, despite its straightforward nature.

The girl stopped dead in her tracks when the fireball hit her. “That was...really bad. Not thematic at all. You didn’t even try! It wasn’t even skull-shaped!”

Khajiit just stared at the girl.  _ What was she? What the hell was she? _

He commanded his dragon to attack her, and she just shook her head. “Okay, watch closely. You need to fight consistently, and in such a way as it reveals the sort of combatant you are.”

Then she turned and put some distance between her and the dragon. One of her creations leapt to intercept it, actually managing to block it and hold its forelimbs in place. Khajiit was about to [Fireball] the thing when he saw what the girl was doing.

_ Was she changing clothes? _

She’d taken out a longer, black robe, and had somehow grown about a foot while stooping over slightly. She put on a large, beaklike mask, and a short, leather hat with a brim. Then, she dumped a vial of something on herself, and her hair turned black, straightened out.

When she spoke, her voice echoed hollowly. “Alright. I am ready to show you how important fighting with your image in mind can be.”

The thing released his dragon. Khajiit just couldn’t bring himself to do anything, at this point. And some part of him did somewhat enjoy the idea of new knowledge, and this...thing definitely seemed knowledgeable. Even if the knowledge was strange.

Then, she leapt towards the dragon, except her leap carried her slowly, almost lazily. The dragon swiped viciously at her, but she somehow drifted out of the way of the swipes. She landed effortlessly in front of the dragon, and spoke commandingly in her hollow voice.

“Your humours are imbalanced. I shall fix this.”

A massive needle, filled with a sickly yellow liquid, was produced from under her coat. The Skeletal Dragon’s claws never even seemed to get close to her, throwing up dust and chunks of gravestone, but the thing continued relentlessly forward. With lazy ease, it dodged under one claw-swipe by bending backwards far further than a spine should allow, then crawled, spiderlike, around another strike. It moved with a horrific ease, casually twisting its body into unnatural shapes in order to avoid blows.

Then, it inserted the needle into one of the dragon’s forelimbs. Before Khajiit could register it, the fluid inside was gone, and the dragon’s attacks actually began speeding up, even as the bones began to slowly grow to the same sickly yellow color the liquid had been.

Then he realized the mental link with his summoned dragon was broken. In a panic, he yelled for it to stop the attack, but it didn’t listen, attacking the dark, bird-masked figure with a psychotic rage he wouldn’t have thought possible for mindless undead to have at all.

The figure dodged as easily as before. Easier, even. The dragon had little control over itself, it looked like, and its swings, while more numerous, were also far more predictable. She slowly, deliberately, placed the massive needle back into her cloak. Then, her other hand drew forth, trailing grey-black behind it. Ash.

She stood still for a moment, and the dragon raised both forelimbs to strike her down. She simply blew the ashes into its face, and the color drained out of it. Not merely the yellow, but all color. Then, it collapsed to the ground.

Khajiit didn’t even know what to think. Those skills were entirely unknown to him. He hadn’t the foggiest idea what had just happened, even as the girl threw the mask and cloak aside and one of her followers collected it, sobbing silently.

Khajiit still didn’t feel terrified. But he knew he really, really should, that there was a very good reason for it, and that fear tended to signal a very good time to run away. He couldn’t, though, even as the girl pranced up to him.

“You get it?” She asked. “I’m just going to fix this place up. Your city isn’t a city  _ of _ the dead, not really. There should be an idea to it, a theme. It should be cohesive, coherent. There are so many kinds of death, so many places you could go. Plagues, violence, politics, starvation, natural disaster, pristine and causeless.”

Khajiit just nodded. He couldn’t leave. The information she was feeding him kept him rooted to the spot.

“Look, our clientele will be here soon. Very, very soon, probably. I really shouldn’t have given you that visual demonstration. But look, I’m here to help you out, okay? They’re going to really love this.”

Khajiit just managed to choke out, “Love this? They deserve to  _ die. _ ”

The girl just laughed. “Nobody  _ deserves _ to die. I’m just generous. Still, that’s not really why I’m here.”

Khajiit just boggled at her. Of course they deserved to die! They were mortals! But he couldn’t bring himself to argue with her.

“Anyway, I’m going to go seal off the entrances of the city while I get this place prepared. IT’s going to take a lot of work, and hopefully this will give me enough time.” She looked up at the moon. “I should really get going. Don’t move, you’re an important part of this.”

_ Oh thank Shurshana. As soon as she left he could probably flee. _

“Not that you’ll have a choice.” His eyes had time to widen, there was a flash of metal, and he collapsed, paralyzed. 

At least he could relax about one thing. Those Blue Rose bitches had messed with his death cult, Zuranon before and gotten away with it. This time, though, they’d be facing that girl. And he had a feeling they would be far more afraid than he was.

Huh. He actually  _ was _ afraid. That was probably a bad sign.

* * *


	7. Chapter 7

Evileye was lost in thought as Blue Rose sat in rare silence. Specifically, Evileye was thinking about how strong a spellcaster who could massacre a whole city must be. She had to be ready for this fight, really ready. With this many minions, with all the time they had to prepare while Blue Rose was moving in? This was going to be very tough.

Everyone else was probably thinking something similar. Worse yet, they’d be going in alone. No other adamantine ranked adventurers had volunteered to go, and anyone under that was just standing outside one of the the gates of the city, trying to prevent the undead from breaking loose.

Someone in the adventurer camp had mentioned that he thought he saw a group of six adventurers sneak in some hours prior. Left unsaid was the fact that, whatever they had wanted to accomplish, they were likely already dead.

Evileye looked at Lakyus, lost in prayer. She was using [Clairvoyance] to make sure of the location of their foe, and ensure that they entered through the correct gate. Evileye would have called it a waste of time, but it had been a help many times before. Whatever was happening in there, it was worth letting it continue a little longer so that they had a better chance to stop it.

Probably. Some adventurers had reported smelling ozone or seeing bright flashes within the city’s walls. She’d sincerely hoped that they were exaggerating. She knew she could probably handle, or at least survive, no matter what this mysterious foe threw at them, but her friends were important too. And if Lakyus died...

No. She would make sure that didn’t happen.

Lakyus stood. “Alright, we’re going through the northern gate. Our target is the town hall. Form up, everyone.”

Evileye stood. There would be no banter, no laughing or cheery assurances. They were the best of the best, and even they were unsure of whether or not they could defeat this. But they had to try.

All business.

The twins, Tia and Tina, were prepping their daggers with holy water. Gagaran was giving a few practice swings with her war pick, a solemn expression on her face. Lakyus was staring pensively at the gates. Evileye? She was worrying herself sick behind her mask. Not that she would be able to worry herself too sick, perks of being undead.

She adjusted her mask slightly. Now or never.

Blue Rose moved to the northern gate, still sealed shut. No undead had tried to get out, something the gathered adventurers looked very thankful for. Too many of them already sported ugly-looking zombie bites and scratches from a hasty retreat from the city, carefully being tended to by teammates.

_ No wonder people don’t like undead. _ Evileye thought unhappily.

Lakus nodded to Gagaran, and the massive woman strode up to the great double gates of the city and pushed them wide open with a creak. They stepped into the city of the dead.

It was eerily empty.

The gates swung shut behind them as they fanned out, looking for some sign of the undead. Evileye’s boots clacked against the cobblestones. There were bloodstains, and shattered windows, and destroyed doors, but no undead as far as she could see.

“Should we investigate one of the buildings? There might be survivors.” Gagaran called out.

Lakyus shook her head. “[Clairvoyance] gave me no hints of survivors. Just death, the stink of it centered on town hall.”

Gagaran made a face, but didn’t argue. They couldn’t afford to as they began moving. Every so often, someone’s head would whirl to look at a window, and Evileye could have sworn she’d seen several things moving in her peripheral vision, but they’d still seen no signs of either life or undeath.

Then, they heard a voice, faint, murmuring. No hesitation, they moved to investigate, Gagaran and Lakyus in the lead. 

They found a young man in raggedy clothes sobbing by the side of the road. He was sobbing dejectedly into his hands, knelt down. Gagaran approached, cautiously. Chances were good this was a trap.

“-did she do to me?”

Gagaran called out to him from just inside her prodigious melee range. “Do you need help?”

“Need help. Neeeed heelp. Need hellllp. What did she do to me?” With that, the man’s sobs ceased, and he turned to look at Gagaran. Tears were streaming down his face.

So was his skin.

He started staggering towards Gagaran, yelling, “Help!” even as his own body was melting around him. Gagaran, to her credit, didn’t hesitate. She hit him in the head, and took him down. No time for sentimentality. Whoever this person was, they were dangerous. Evileye had never seen a spell like that.

Suddenly, she was aware of movement and noise all around her party.

* * *

Skitter had said to test the strength of one of the strongest adventuring parties.

Part of the issue was something Lung had told her. There were  _ so many _ kinds of strength. She’d categorized them in her lab later that day. Physical strength, emotional strength, tactical ability, social clout, spiritual oneness, bonds between individuals. She’d thought of a lot, and found many more catalogued in books in the Crypt’s library.

Skitter hadn’t told her what sort of strength she wanted to know about. So Bonesaw decided to throw art at the wall and see what sticks. Splatter-painting, so to speak.

* * *

Blue Rose was cracking. Whatever these...things were, they weren’t trying to  _ fight _ . They would scream and beg for help as their skin bubbled and their eyes boiled and their teeth rotted, but they wouldn’t bite. They would just grip her clothes, sink down, and start begging.

The problem was that there were so many that if Evileye gave them the chance to start begging, she’d be crushed under the mass of rapidly decaying bodies. Worse yet, she’d tried to use [Fly] to get away from the miserable meat-sacks, only to find that they could somehow leap up to her as she flew up, their legs shattering and spraying blood. They tried to drag her her back down as fast as she could shake them, and the rest of her team wasn’t exactly faring a whole lot better.

They weren’t doing badly, mind. But they weren’t winning. There seemed to be hundreds of these things, and killing opponents who weren’t even really fighting back was starting to take its toll. Evileye was fine with it; they were clearly monsters of some sort, and therefore perfectly fine to kill. But Tina was starting to look queasy, and Lakyus had an ugly expression on her face as she swung her massive, cursed sword.

They needed a decisive strike, and Evileye was pretty sure her friends could cover for her while she was low on mana. She decided that taking out as many of them as fast as possible would get them to the true culprit faster. So she broke out a spell she didn’t use often, [Crystal Crush Swarm]. Exorbitantly expensive to cast, but it would wipe the floor with these strange, sad things.

And so it did, crystals winding up embedded in heads, torsos, limbs, faces. Inaccurate, but she could shape it around her teammates, and more importantly, it took care of that stupid horde. She felt a ghastly and accusatory wind rise up from the dead bodies, and shivered. Even though she was a vampire, and, by all rights, should be beyond chills. Everyone else looked even more worried, though. That fight had been unsettling, compared to the usual evil death-monsters.

Even Tia and Tina looked green around the gills, for all of their previous experience killing people. Those were worse, somehow. Suffering more, for one, and somehow she got the sense that killing them hadn’t put them out of their misery.

Blue Rose marched on, though. They had a job to do. 

* * *

The next foe that reared its ugly head had been worrying for different reasons. This one was fighting, and it was pretty strong.

Evileye was fine, for now, and with the whole team fully equipped, the fight was going pretty well. Better than the last one, for sure. Then things got worse. The massive amalgamate of fused bone and flesh had shifted, and moved. Not to regenerate though, no. Instead, faces were appearing all up and down its body. Tearful, begging for freedom. Hands would trail along Garagran and Lakyus as they passed in close, trying to deal a decisive blow to the thing.

Then, a gesture, and two sobbing forms with melting skin burst out of a house nearby and started staggering towards the beast. More emerged, soon after. This time, though, the sobbing people fought back, feebly, before they were killed. They apologized every second of it.

Evileye knew they couldn’t just roll over and let the sobbing things reach the massive amalgamate. Still, she didn’t want to waste yet more mana on another [Crystal Crush Swarm]. She was still slowly recovering her mana from the first one, and anything that could make things like this would need every ounce of mana she could bring to bear on it.

Instead, she watched as Lakyus burned a spell on it, branding it with holy light. It seemed to take offense to that, but wasn’t able to mount enough of a defense as her strikes took it apart.

Lakyus took a breath while the other members of Blue Rose mopped up the sobbing figures. The air felt weirdly oppressive, and Evileye almost thought she could see thick, blue smoke curling up from the bodies of the sobbing figures-

_ Shit! _ Evileye realized too late that the smoke, near-invisible in the night, was what had been carrying that uneasy feeling. She should have been immune to poison! This foe was ridiculous. Though, she wasn’t feeling anything besides this feeling of pessimism and hopelessness. She could see her fellow party members were feeling it far, far worse. She rushed down to tell them.

* * *

The trek through the city had gotten steadily worse once they had started fleeing from the sobbies. They’d lurk there, at the edges of their awareness, begging for help and relief, and Blue Rose had to leave them alone. Worse were the massive amalgamates, of which there had been more than one, and which they had to kill despite the noxious blue smoke roiling off of their corpses.

Too fast to avoid.

But then the whispering sobbies had backed off. The city had grown eerily silent again. Someone cracked a joke, Evileye didn’t really listen. They were all starting to feel very frayed at the edges.

So when they saw another adventuring party approach, looking as haggard and harried as they felt, they almost cheered. Then they got a second look, and saw their eyes were streaming tears, that their skin was a horrific shade of blue, and that their whoops of joy at spotting Blue Rose sounded far too inhuman for anyone’s liking.

Evileye barely even registered it as the adventuring party unfolded in front of her, turning themselves inside out. With insides that somehow ended in many, many sharp edges and spewed caustic liquids that burnt more potently than Evileye’s [Acid Splash].

Just more nightmares to fight. She could panic later. For now, she wasn’t even breaking much of a sweat. She had to make sure her friends stayed alright through this, first. Crying herself hysterically to sleep could come when she was tucked away safely in some nice inn somewhere.

She dodged a large, sharpened bone, fired from a bow wielded by what had been the ranger. Now, it wielded a longbow as large as it was, made from its own ribs, and strung with its own muscle fibres.

She would probably want a nice, hot meal first, though. Not blood, she wasn’t allowed to drink the blood of people who Blue Rose wasn’t trying to kill, and she couldn’t eat much real food, but it was absolutely a comfort.

She drove a spike of crystal deep into what looked like an exposed heart, which immediately attempted to crawl free of the monster’s reverse-ribcage.

Maybe she would take the time to real one of those books Tina had gotten her. She’d never really found the time, before. Not having to sleep meant taking watch, more often than not. But she could take a night off, stay as warm as she could swaddled in blankets, read a book.

Gagaran’s foe exploded, and reddish smoke began flowing into the air.  _ It’s fine, she’s fine, don’t think about it don’t think about it don’t think about it. _

She was going to see if they could take a vacation, after this was over. A vacation sounded nice. Somewhere where it was always day, maybe.

She drifted around the reddish mist and moved to hit another adventurer.

* * *

Evileye just wanted this to be  _ over. _ She’d already used way more mana than she’d meant to, Tia had already burned through three healing potions, Lakyus was starting to look really mentally exhausted which was probably really bad news given her cursed sword, it was just all bad.

Still, street by street they’d carved a bloody swathe up to the town hall.

Evileye watched as two...surprisingly normal looking figures walked out of the hall to face them.

One was dressed in the robes of a magistrate, a regal-looking wig that shook and shuddered in an unsettlingly alive way atop his head. He carried a staff, but unlike the gaudy sorts of things that powerful wizards usually liked to show off, his was oaken, and simple. The only odd thing about it was the tiny city model on the end of it. He himself seemed withered, shrunken.

Next to him was a woman who moved with feral grace. Metal plates, like scales, shimmered on her skin. No, in her skin, they were grafted on all over. She smiled a predatory grin at them, and she saw the sheen of coppery teeth.  _ Wait, were those adventurer plates?  _ Evileye’s eyes widened under her mask as she thought through the implications of a woman wearing that many identification plates, several of them looking like mithril or orichalcum.

The woman was acting excited, bouncing on her feet and looking eagerly from person to person. The man, on the other hand, addressed them with a regal grace. “Welcome, travelers, to my humble city. I am the Mayor here, and myself and my Secretary were just about to go for a little walk. Have my citizens been treating you well?”

Blue Rose just launched straight into combat. They were fed up with mind games, fed up with all the bullshit in this insane gods-damned city, fed up with people melting and turning inside out and exploding and screaming, screaming, always screaming. They were sick and tired and  _ done. _

They very quickly found that the Mayor was no pushover, and his Secretary was brutal. She cackled, “ADveNturErS! aDVentUreRS!” and went at them hammer-and-tongs with a pair of spell-storing daggers grafted into her palms. Tia and Tina were using [Shadow Clones] to try and overwhelm her with force of numbers, but it wasn’t working. She just danced between them.

The Mayor, meanwhile, had been dealing with them with serene grace and dignity. Summoning undead, callously sending them towards us to get slaughtered, laying down fireballs to keep us suppressed. He was casting at a rate Evileye could only dream of, and holding off Gargaran and Lakyus besides, and  _ nothing was working! _ Her spells would be reflected, or resisted, or would just bounce off. Her crystals would shatter against his skin.

She didn’t know what to do. They were losing badly. Gargaran staggered after a well timed [Freezing Wind] crashed into her and lines of frost started spiderwebbing over her armor. Lakyus didn’t see the swipe from a large skeletal minion come at her from the side, and she staggered. Tia was bleeding, Tina was unconscious, the Secretary drooling over her as Tia roared vengeance. Evileye was unharmed, but only because [Fly] was giving her just enough maneuverability to dodge, and she couldn’t get a proper hit in with her spells.

_ Fuck! _

She tried a different tack. She didn’t have a lot of options for debuffing, but she had to do  _ something, _ and none of her direct damage spells were working. She tried a [Crippling Sky], then a [Malevolent Curse], then a [Star of Ill Omen]. She started casting spells more recklessly. No more conserving mana, her friends were going to  _ die _ if she didn’t step up. She fought, and fought, and fought.

Her friends fell, but they weren’t dead. Lakyus wasn’t dead. She couldn’t be. She was fighting the two of them alone now, but they were hurting, and then she speared the Secretary with a [Crystal Lance] more with luck than with skill, and left her trapped and squirming, impaled through the chest.

There was no banter on her end, and the Mayor, for what it was worth, seemed to acknowledge her silence. He didn’t try to talk, either. All it came down to, in the end, was a duel of spellcasters. Mage against mage.

Evileye won, of course. Barely. She collapsed to her knees, her mana reserves so close to empty that she’d probably lose to one of those fucking sobbing bastards if one walked out right now. She was running on fumes, but she had to, she had to get her teammates out of here. Let someone else clear out the rest of the undead.

Then, as she fell to her knees to catch her breath, a little girl, who looked fairly tired herself, walked out of the town hall, surveying the destruction. The feebly twitching woman on the lance of crystal, the corpse of the man, her fallen friends. The girl walked over to her, and Evileye just couldn’t bring herself to move.

“You were really strong.” The girl said. “You made it all the way to the end. You’re a lot stronger than your friends.”

Evileye wanted to laugh. Who was this girl to say things like that? She wanted to do something, say something pithy, or just bite this girl’s neck and be done with it, but her body just wouldn’t comply. She felt so  _ tired _ .

“Even with your humours imbalanced, you made it over here. You really should be proud of that.”

Evileye just couldn’t bring herself to care.

“Here, let me see your face.”

The girl reached out a hand, pulled off her mask, delicately.

Some distant part of her yelled that this girl could see right through the illusion of humanity, that she knew her identity as a vampire. She didn’t care.

The girl gave a smile.

“I think I’m going to keep you. For now, though, you should sleep.”

Evileye did.


	8. Chapter 8

Lung walked.

He had left the carriage behind several miles back. It had been moving at breakneck pace, yes, while Lung merely plodded. It had given him time to pore over his book, and over the parchments of notes Harbinger had given him.

Stuffy prick, but a stuffy prick with very good handwriting.

Skitter’s job was one he was looking forward to. “Go to the Slane Theocracy. Find what you can, information, items, anything useful. Do not connect yourself to me.” Simple orders, but with so much room for interpretation. Skitter had given him a great responsibility. He could choose what he would do, he would decide what to look for, what approaches to take.

He flexed a muscle, scales hidden under an illusion of human flesh. The Slane Theocracy would attack demihumans on sight, according to Harbinger’s notes. He had wondered why it was that he would be given a ring to hide himself, given how he was as likely as not to just charge in and demand what he wanted.

He’d realized just before he had decided to leave the carriage behind. This was a test of his strength. Of all his strength, not just that his body and abilities gave him. Skitter had set before him a challenge that, were he to charge in with his usual tactics as the singular threat, would likely result in failure, with Lung brought down by some unexpectedly strong item or individual.

_ Always assume your target is concealing a trump card, and plan accordingly.  _ Wise words from one of the many guides he had read.

So he would need to rely on other types of strength that he wasn’t sure he had. He’d left the carriage then, deciding that relying on it was showing weakness before he had even had the chance to prove otherwise.

The problem was that he had no idea how to go about leveraging other types of strength. Did he try to hold some high-ranking theocrat hostage? Sneak through underground tunnels? Scour back alleys for people with information?

Lung just wasn’t one for planning. He was never the sort who would be able to map out the plans of his foes, anticipate what they would do. He just adapted. But here, just going in swinging wasn’t an option. He would be showing Skitter that he wasn’t strong enough to not use his strength.

This drove Lung to make an important decision. He wasn’t good at planning, but he also wasn’t good at leading or commanding. The only way to get better at those things was practice and hard work. He needed people to lead for that, and that’s where he came up with his brand-new, bare-bones plan. He had to practice making plans, too.

He would make an independent group, apart from whatever sort of people combatted monsters in this place, and surround himself with subordinates. He would be able to practice leading. Better yet, he would be able to look at the sort of strengths his subordinates would show, and learn from them. Then, he would use them to help him create a better plan, and go from there.

It was a good plan.

It was early afternoon by the time Lung arrived in the small town he was headed to. It was a quiet looking town. A few armored individuals lounged about, wearing the crest of the theocracy. Guards of some sort, most likely. The town itself contained a great number of neatly arranged, sleepy-looking buildings. It stretched, extending along either side of the main thoroughfare, and in the center of it Lung could see a fountain engraved with holy symbols around which people were milling about.

Lung cracked his knuckles and strode towards the town’s center. He may have looked human because of the illusion, but he was still massive, and people’s heads turned as he passed. He ignored their whisperings. Unimportant. They had nothing to say that would interest him, no words that could tell him where he could find the strong, and begin to lead them.

The conversation died away as Lung entered the square with the fountain, and began to gather information. He had never understood the idea of wandering hither and thither in order to do so. Ask random people, going up to random individuals? Ridiculous. Far better to gather the people to you, because then the information would all be brought to you as well, and you merely had to get it out.

So Lung roared, “Gather!” in a commanding tone. The townspeople turned to look, bemused looks on their faces. The guards seemed less entertained and more worried, and their hands went to their weapons. One moved away, probably to find more guards. Good. Let them. One of them might be strong.

A small crowd began forming in front of Lung, and he cast his eye about them. Old crones, children, women. Not many men. Lung didn’t quite understand why that was. There were more female Guardians than male, as well. Were females more numerous than males? No, there seemed to be about as many children of one sort as the other. Were the men more afraid of him for some reason?

He would think about that later. For now, action. “I come seeking your strongest. Bring them to me.”

The crowd in front of him rippled in consternation. One old woman yelled out, “We don’t need no adventurers lookin’ for a fight in here!” Another cried, “We got plenty of soldiers about to protect us!”

Lung shook his head. “You misunderstand. I seek your strongest that I may train, and that they may in turn.”

“What the hell? You come out here for a recruitin’ pitch for your team? Ain’t no need for you mercenaries here.”

It was someone different every time a voice raised above the crowd’s general murmurings, Lung noted. The crowd was also swelling in size, males locking buildings and leaving them behind before joining the crowd. Strange, that they would delay. He saw a lot of curiosity. He also saw more armored individuals leading someone in strange blue robes and carrying some sort of amulet and a book. A priest?

“I do not recruit. Simply seek strength. It is in the nature of those who are strong to grow stronger. Thus, those who are strong will seek to join me of their own accord.”

“Oh? You don’t look so strong, yourself!” Two of the armored folk were in heated discussion with the robed man.

Lung snorted. He couldn’t begin his buff-loop, but he could at least demonstrate the power in his base form. He simply punched the ground with a light [Shockwave]. Dust flew into the air, the fountain behind him cracked and started spewing water at odd angles. The buildings on the edge of the square shuddered. And everyone in the square was bowled over.

The man in the blue robes was one of the first to regain his feet, and he spoke in a charismatic voice that echoed in a way even Lung’s hadn’t. “Foul demon, no human possesses such skills. Show your true form! [Revealing Light]!”

Lung would have laughed. This priest shook even as he crowed and cast the spell. It made it all the more surprising when the bolt of blue-white light shone down from the sky and stripped the illusion bare, revealing Lung in all of his scaled, draconic glory.

_ I suppose it was only a minor cosmetic item, after all. _

Lung threw the ring to the ground and bellowed, even as people began reacting with fear.

“How did a monster get in here?”

“Guards! Guards! Kill it!”

“Oh god run it’s going to kill us all!”

A little girl, eyes wide, fled the crowd. An old man knelt down, trembling. A woman pushed a boy behind her and spread her arms. Lung snorted. It wasn’t as though he was going to kill them just because he looked a little different.

A crossbow bolt thunked harmlessly against Lung’s scales. The guardsman dropped the weapon as soon as Lung whirled to face him, and began to yell, “Isurrenderisurrenderisurrender!”

That made Lung angry. This man attacked him, as if he were strong, then immediately backed down? Weak. Lung rocketed towards the man, a swipe of his claw sending him careening through several buildings. More guardsmen tried to intercept him, but they did so tentatively, with shaking arms and quivering legs.

“If you aren’t strong, then stay in your place!” Lung roared, and tore into them, sending the ridiculous armored cowards flying with every movement of his claws and tail. The townsfolk were screaming, which Lung thought was ridiculous. He wasn’t hurting them, after all. He was barely even using any fire, to make sure of it. One of them might know someone strong, after all.

The priest was gibbering something and cast a spell which fizzled harmlessly against Lung’s scales. Lung responded by picking up his discarded illusion ring and throwing it through the annoying man’s head. Poetic justice, Lung thought.

Attackers defeated, lying broken in the streets around him, Lung turned back to the townspeople. They had stilled during the fight, not daring to move for fear of being targeted. Lung noticed one guardsman who, rather than fight, had thrown his armor aside and gone to sit in the group of townspeople. A wise choice.

“Now, tell me, who among you is strong?” Lung roared once more. Nobody answered for several seconds. Then someone stood. He looked no less terrified than anyone else, but he had a glint of something in his eye. Hope, or maybe determination.

“The Six Great Gods will send their emissaries to strike you down!” He yelled. Lung scoffed.

“You would think, if your gods were so great, they would have struck me down already.”

A wave of gasps swept the crowd, and now they were on their feet, yelling at him. Oaths of vengeance, solemn promises that the gods would strike him down, that something called a Scripture would hunt him to the end of the world. They were glowing with rage, the whole town.

Lung realized it then. This town, they had a strength to them. A strength of faith, a sense of trust in the forces beyond them to be able to protect them, to let them live another day in peace. Lung thought it was ridiculous. Their strength had made their town weak, and passive. When Lung had been tearing through the people whom they had put their faith in, they simply sat by and did nothing, simply moving their faith to higher targets.

This was pointless. Their strength was worthless. Faith was a strength he couldn’t use, didn’t want.

Then Lung thought for a moment, and realized he was wrong. It wasn’t that he had no use for a strength of faith. It was that he already had that strength of faith. He had faith that Skitter and the Guardians would deliver him if he were to fail, that his untouchability was further backed up by the strength of the rest of the Hive.

Looking at the shattered town, the people whose impassioned shouts were dying away the longer Lung simply stood there, unchallenged, Lung decided that faith was not a strength, but a weakness. Faith in Skitter had led him here, had revealed his true form to some worthless priest, and had led him to leave his plan in an unfinished state because Skitter would simply tell him if he was going to do something wrong.

But she wasn’t.

This was a test for himself and only himself.

With a shock, he realized that she would forsake him just as their gods had no answer for these pitiful followers, should he fail. That his faith was holding his strength back. That his plans were  _ nothing, _ that he had convinced these villagers of  _ nothing,  _ that he had learned  _ nothing. _

Right now, Lung was alone. And so were the villagers, who cowered once more before him.

Quieter, Lung said, “The gods aren’t coming. Not today.” The villagers flinched at his words, at the solemn tone he spoke them in. He could see tears, see people who were already questioning what they had thought inviolable. 

“So, once more, bring forth your strong, that we may find our way while the gods turn elsewhere.”

“T-t-those were our strong.” A man in the crowd said. He gestured to the fallen guards.

Lung shook his head. “They were not strong. They were afraid.”

Someone else yelled, “Fear is not weakness!”

Lung turned to look at them. “No, but what they showed was not strength. They fought not because they were strong, but because they were afraid.”

The crowd was silent, and so was Lung. It seemed nobody strong would come. Lung stood. He may as well burn this place down before he left. He would find nothing here, and there was no point in leaving information behind.

Someone screamed as Lung breathed in, his mouth glowing with heat as he prepared to incinerate the lot of them.

Then a young voice rang out across the square. “Dragon! I will meet your challenge!”

Lung turned to see the girl that had fled the crowd earlier. Her pink dress had mud staining the hem, her feet were bare, her dark hair was hidden under the pot she wore on her head, and she gripped a wooden sword and a small practice shield as she stared him down.

And her eyes  _ burned. _ There was a certainty in them, a certainty born of a thousand thousand stories where the knight valiantly charged to the people’s defense. A certainty that if she tried her hardest to fill the role, that reality would stand aside.

Lung stared at this girl, and he knew.

_ This was the strength I was looking for. _

This was someone who didn’t  _ care _ if they didn’t have the sort of strength that was really needed for a situation. They would go anyway, without hesitation.

That was a strength Lung needed. He could flatten this girl, incinerate her, because he was stronger than her. But he couldn’t, because she was stronger than him.

Lung lost.

The little girl charged and Lung couldn’t kill her. But he could start putting her strength, her certainty, to work. He could reveal her own strength to her. And maybe, just maybe, she could teach him.

So Lung still won, and that made his loss sting less.

Lung’s firebreath moved towards her like a wall, and she simply raised her shield. Lung turned the heat down to lukewarm, and diverted it to either side of her. She showed no surprise as the fire cleared and she was unscathed. It was simply how the world should be.

Lung leapt towards her and swung a vicious claw which was parried harmlessly. She swung, and Lung’s knee hit the dirt. She swing again, and Lung was knocked down, lying in the dust while the town looked on in awe. The little girl strode up to him, and pointed her wooden sword at his head.

“Now, dragon, surrender.”

Lung smiled at her. “You, little one, are strong. I will not surrender, my pride as a dragon will not permit me.”

She raised the sword over her head, but Lung continued speaking. “However, I will leave these people in peace, on one condition. You come with me, and we share our strength with each other.

The little girl looked at the massive dragon, and then at the sword and shield in her hand, and then asked, “Why? Why should I go with you?”

“Because you are strong, little girl, and because you will never see your strength emerge in this town. Because this town is sheltered, and had I not come here your strength would have gone on, untested and unused. Because you, little girl, can slay dragons.”

She lowered her sword to point at Lung again, “So why do I not just slay you now?”

Lung snapped the sword in her hands, and her eyes widened. She stumbled backwards, and Lung stood. “Because you are strong, but your body is not. I can fix that, give you the strength that lets me do this,” Lung gestured to the destruction around him.

She nodded. “I’ll need a new sword.”

“The best.”

“And you,” she jabbed a finger at Lung, “Will destroy no more towns.”

Lung nodded. It was a fair trade. The girl turned back to the townsfolk, who looked stunned.

“Mom, dad? I need to go. I’m going to be a knight.”

“No! No, please, Kirta, you can’t-”

“Mom, it’s okay. I just beat a dragon. I just saved you. It’s okay.”

The little girl turned to Lung. “Let’s go.”

Lung nodded, and led the little girl away. As they left, he heard a little sob behind him, and turned back to see the little girl trying furiously to wipe away tears before he saw.

“Sadness is not weakness. You may cry, so long as you move forward.”

He turned and kept walking. The little girl sobbed behind him. 

* * *

Kirta had finished crying by the time they stopped walking. At some point, the tears had just stopped, and left her focusing on how her feet hurt, and how heavy her shield was, and how the pot kept clanging around on her head, and how sad her broken sword was.

She wished she’d picked up the other half of it. She’d spent so much time with her dad, practicing. Mom had said that dad had been a soldier, once. Kirta thought that being a soldier sounded really sad. You weren’t special, then. You just fought. Her dad had even told her about people...dying in wars. She hadn’t really understood how sad that was.

Today, though, she’d seen so many people who were...dead. Not that it was going to stop there. People died in stories, too. It wasn’t all that different seeing them. With her own two eyes. Lying there. People she’d known.

Kirta hugged herself.

Her dad had told her about a lot of things, and her mom’s stories had told her the rest. Her mother had never learned to read, herself, but she’d seemed so happy when a messenger from the Big City had come to talk about something called a Press and how now everyone would be able to get stories. She’d bought so many books, and she’d told Kirta, “You need to learn how to read. There are so many important secrets in there.”

Kirta had learned. From all the business-people in town. They’d had to learn, even if they hadn’t had books until that Press came in. But Kirta had gotten to read all kinds of wonderful stories to her mom. Stories about brave knights, and cruel dragons. Stories about strong monsters, and stronger men.

Kirta had wondered why there weren’t any women knights. Now that she was going to become one herself, she could sort of see why. Being a knight was really scary. She didn’t think being a knight usually meant having a big dragon train you, but they never really said in the stories.

Sitting, she watched as the dragon knelt down by the brook, facing her. A moment of silence passed. Kirta just watched him. He had been loud, and after she’d run to grab her sword and shield, he had hurt a lot of people. She was just glad she’d been able to stop him from hurting more.

“My name is Lung.”

“I’m Kirta.”

She sat as upright as she could, like a knight would sit, and stared at him without fear, like a knight would stare. He had already said she was stronger than him, even after all he had done. She knew that he could kill her easily, that he was really really good at killing things. But dragons were supposed to be good at killing things. Kirta knew that as a little girl, she wasn’t supposed to be strong. Guards in the street would help her when she was carrying something heavy home, Mister Heldock would tussle her hair, Miss Juniper would coo about how pretty she was getting.

So she was special, somehow, and the dragon had seen it when she’d fought him. Somehow, it had let her beat him. Kirta thought maybe she had one of those Talents that you sometimes heard about people having, though nobody had ever told her about something like that.

Dragons were supposed to be wise. Maybe that was how he’d seen it.

Still, she was a knight now. The dragon would teach her things, and then she’d save more people. Maybe she’d even see her parents again. She’d slay more dragons, like that scary Catastrophe Dragon people were talking about in the square the other day.

Lung hadn’t moved while she thought. He’d just continued to sit there. Now, though, he stood. “You’ll need new clothes, and some new equipment.”

Kirta watched as he pulled out a roll of cloth from where it was tucked into his belt and unrolled it into the air. A door?

“Come in.”

He opened the door, and she followed.

The inside was made of wood, and there were a lot of tables and a counter at the back. Kirta had never been in an inn before herself, but she knew from stories that this was what they ought to look like. It wasn’t really the kind of place she thought dragons slept in, though. It looked very normal. Dragons were supposed to have lairs, this one had some nice tables and a weird cloth door.

Lung turned to her. “Ring the bell at the counter, and say what you want to eat, and you’ll get it. Your room is the first door on the right upstairs. I am going to get you your equipment. Please wait here.”

Lung left out the front door, and Kirta made her way up to the counter. She rung the bell, got a plateful of food, and went upstairs to her new room to eat. It was very plain. She didn’t have any books, and she didn’t have any toys, and she didn’t even have any clothes or shoes besides her mud-stained dress. Just a neat bed, and an empty desk, and a chair, and a little magic light.

She cried a little more. She missed her home, and her parents, and her toys and her stories and everything.

She carefully put all the things she had left on the desk. First, the pot on her head. Lightly dented. Then the wooden shield, then the splintered half-sword.

She didn’t really feel like a knight anymore. She was just alone, now.

* * *

The Inquisitor looked at the damage with a keen eye. He had been observing demihuman attacks for a long time. All too often, some monster with a death wish would wander in, or some demihuman would throw a fit after the Theocracy had a crucial victory.

What made this odd was that this was very far into human territory, and no dragonkin had been spotted anywhere nearby up until one had walked in looking like a human and torn the village apart. What was stranger still was the result.

Guards, dead, but of the townsfolk not one had been killed, and the demihuman had walked off with a young girl and nothing else. The townspeople swore up and down that the silver dragonkin had been looking for strong people.

_ So why that girl? _

The Inquisitor looked at the body of the town’s resident priest. Blue robes stained dark with blood, head exploded as if from a great impact. The townspeople had said the dragonkin had flicked something at him.

It was an unpleasant business, but perhaps he would learn something.

He poked around, and didn’t come away empty handed. A ring, covered in blood. A cursory [Identify] revealed it was magical, with some sort of illusory ability. The Inquisitor pocketed it for later investigation from the Divination department. Perhaps it would allow them to track down the culprit and slay them to avenge the little girl.

The Inquisitor was sure the girl was dead. She’d been taken by a demihuman. Whatever it had said, the Inquisitor had seen enough to know what it  _ meant. _

_ Still, why her? _

She hadn’t seemed particularly special, from what he could gather. Hardly the only little girl in the village, nor was she particularly gifted at magic. Her dad had given her a little training in swordplay, which was odd, but hardly something that set her apart from all the guards who lay dead in the streets.

She had challenged him, according to the townsfolk, but so had the guards. Perhaps a ritual, or a tribute to a Dragon Lord? He couldn’t really say.

Regardless, he had a job to do. To bring the holy hand of vengeance down on the demihuman scum who thought he could get away with attacking the Theocracy on its own soil. All he had to do was find them, and then the full force of humanity’s might would take them down.

Justice.

* * *

Lung knocked on the door fifteen minutes later with a large trunk held under one arm. He dropped it without ceremony on the floor by Kirta’s bed, and told her to be back outside in thirty minutes.

The trunk held a lot. Several plain dresses in different colors, a new wooden sword, some shoes, a nice-looking hat. Underneath all of that was what Kirta was really curious about. Her new armor as a knight.

It was a bright silver, nearly white, unlike the tarnished silver of Lung’s scales. It was smooth, and flowed, and looked perfectly sized to fit her. She put on the helmet, and found that somehow, it didn’t obstruct her vision at all, nor feel very heavy.

_ Is this...magic? _

Under that was her new sword. She could swear it glowed when she took it out from the scabbard. It was clean, and straight, and felt balanced in her hand. She put it away carefully. For all the training he had given her, her dad hadn’t let her wield a real sword yet, and she didn’t want to hurt herself before whatever her training was could begin. 

Her shield was also miraculously light and glimmering.  _ Elven, maybe? All the elven stuff in stories was light and bright.  _ She wondered about how Lung had stolen items for the elves for his horde. As well as why a dragon would have dresses in her size. Since all of this had to come from his hoard.

She put the sword and her armor down carefully, slipped a pair of shoes over her sore feet, put on a clean dress, and ran down the stairs. She kept her wooden shield and sword with her. She had to be a knight, and she didn’t know how to put on the armor.

Lung had indeed been waiting outside, and looked over at her when she exited the door. Kirta noticed a small crate of blood-red potions sitting next to him. Then he stood, bowed slightly with his arms at his sides, and spoke.

“Your training begins here.”

* * *

Lung had one spell. He had many skills, and many strategies, and many techniques, but he also had one spell. It was a powerful one, too. Conferred due to the quantity of buffing abilities Lung had, even if they were all self-targeted and modified.

[Swim Upstream].

It would confer a permanent buff on the target, increasing their combat ability by an amount that was absolutely broken at low levels. It could also be used over and over on the same target, in order to make them stronger each iteration.

The issue was that it required a test. This test would increase in difficulty if the target, who had to be willing, had taken it before, was a higher level, or had powerful items with them. It was an interesting spell, that would make for a great training area should one not mind being heavily outnumbered by enemies who were at least five levels above you the whole time. Even at level 100, the NPCs were just overpowered enough to make them feel like level 105.

Not many in the Hive had seen fit to use it on them. Skitter had, once, but it was tough enough she didn’t think she could beat it again once they knew what she fought like.

Still, the name, and the idea of the spell still stood, even if it would be a death sentence for Kirta. Training someone by scaling the difficulty to be just a little bit too difficult for them. Sadly, Kirta was weak enough in some ways that Lung wasn’t sure he could scale down that far.

Well, that was what the crate of healing potions next to him was for.

He told Kirta, first, that she would be fighting him to train. The second thing he told her was that she had to fight with everything she had. The third thing he told her was that he wasn’t going to use his full strength, but he was still going to use a lot of it.

* * *

Kirta yelped in pain the first time Lung’s fist collided with her shield. Her arm had broken with the impact. Lung gave her a potion.

The second time it happened, she grit her teeth. It still hurt, a lot, but a knight wouldn’t show pain. Lung gave her a potion.

The evening stretched on. Kirta was bruised, beaten, battered, and burned, and Lung would just give her a potion and get back into a fighting stance. The pain was still awful, but she’d started figuring out how to tune it out, how to weather it. When she’d managed to take two hits before going down, Lung stopped.

“Alright. Good job. Bathe,” He pointed at the stream. “Then you may go inside and sleep.”

Kirta just about collapsed. She’d thought she was sore before the training, but now she felt like everything was on fire. Her arms from blocking and swinging, her legs from dodging, her head from half-remembered pain. The cool, clear water of the brook was refreshing, and she staggered up to her door and collapsed onto the bed.

Then she noticed the desk. On it, beside all of her other stuff, was a pile of books. A small note lay atop them.

_ Study these. _

_ -Lung _

The books were thick, and the paper they were on was a bright white. Each letter was crisp, far crisper than the books she was used to, and the titles were strange.

_ Contessa’s Path to PvP _

_ It’s all in the Rep, by Jack Slash _

_ Accord’s Exhaustive Spell Catalog and Effectiveness Analysis _

_ Glaistig Uaine’s Faerie Warrior’s Handbook _

_ Halberds and Hauberks, an Equipment Guide by Parian and Armsmaster _

_ Mouse Protector’s Anti-Bad-Guy Lessons!!! _

She picked up the one that seemed most interesting, the one about Faerie, and read. It wasn’t a storybook, though. Instead, it talked about fighting, about what to expect when you were fighting, and it painted a grim picture.

It talked about looking for signs that monsters could spew acid, about checking corpses nearby for burn marks, guessing how hard it could hit from the depth of the crater it left. It talked about monsters that were weak to fire, water, magic, silver, iron, light, darkness, and noise. It talked about gutting and skinning monsters, about harvesting materials. It talked about which parts of monsters would make for the best weapons, the best armors.

It talked about watching monsters for signs they were about to strike and moving before they did. It talked about how much worth one could get from certain monsters. The language was pretty, but it was also horrifying.

Kirta put it down.

This was her life. This was who she was, now. This was what it meant to save people. It meant living with monsters, fighting them, watching them, talking to them, stealing from them, using them. It meant becoming a monster herself. It meant pain, and anger, and death.

Kirta hugged her knees.

Then she let go of them. She had already faced down a dragon. In stories, that was where things usually ended. But that didn’t mean there wasn’t more story after that, her mother had always told her that the knights didn’t stop being valiant and heroic just because the book had run out of pages.

She didn’t know where the story went. But she was a knight, and she was a hero, and whatever she had to do, she could hold her head high.

Even if it meant more pain.


	9. Chapter 9

Miss Militia watched as Enri loosed another arrow into the straw target.

The girl was doing a lot better. She’d thrown herself at Miss Militia after her parents died, begging the older woman to teach her how to defend herself and her sister. She couldn’t say no to that.

But the way the girl had thrown herself into her training was worrying. Whenever she wasn’t training with her, she was trying to get one of the Wards to sneak her extra lessons, or drawing designs for weapons and defenses in grease pencil.

Miss Militia had hoped that supplying her with something to draw with would take her mind off of training, at least for a little while. The girl was pushing herself too hard. She was showing improvement, sure, and her form was getting better, but at this rate she’d collapse from exhaustion.

It got worse when word came that some sort of tragedy had befallen E-Rantel. Enri had cried all through that night, and spent the next morning turning dummies into pincushions. She seemed angry, really angry. Miss Militia had tried to talk to her, but Enri had steamrolled her by trying to get even more lessons worked in.

Miss Militia had confiscated her bow and her drawing equipment and told her to go relax, and not fifteen minutes later she saw Enri had started sparring with Glory Girl.

And the worst part was that she just kept saying, “I have to protect people, like  _ you. _ ”

Miss Militia had been made strong. Much as she knew, distantly, that she had a childhood, she knew with far more certainty that Chevalier had seen fit to make her peerless with ranged weaponry and give her the ability to summon weapons from an entire wing of the treasury at-will. And yet this girl was trying to claw her way up to Miss Militia’s level, and she was going to kill herself trying.

Which was made all the more evident when Miss Militia, sitting on the porch of the house the villagers let her use, noticed someone sneaking up towards the forest. Someone with a very good quality longbow, a quiver full of arrows, and an Elven Cloak that Miss Militia had given her  _ specifically so that she wouldn’t have to be on the front lines. _

Miss Militia cursed and began running.

* * *

Enri loosed another arrow into the ogre, then ducked behind a tree, scaled it, and began leaping through the branches.

_ Never give them a fair fight. If they’re fighting you fairly, you’ve already lost. _

The Wards had so many good pieces of advice. They never told her where the advice actually came from, but every night that she’d snuck into the Great Forest of Tob, it had served her well. Better yet, she could feel the improvement every time she came out here, and every day she spent training as well.

The ogre struck down the tree she had originally climbed, and she took the opportunity to put another arrow into its back before continuing to move.

The ogre roared. Nearly twenty arrows already stuck out of it already, and she nocked the twenty-first.

Enri regretted not being able to borrow one of Miss Militia’s really powerful weapons, but she had said that Enri wasn’t ready for those yet. Enri had to accept it, after all, Miss Militia, whatever she had done as an adventurer, hadn’t gotten there by getting herself killed trying to use a weapon she couldn’t.

More jumping. More arrows. The ogre kept roaring. At this rate, it was going to bring a warg pack down on her head. She didn’t want to deal with those, they were hard to kill and far more agile and intelligent than stupid ogres.

Soon, Enri could say that she was protecting her home just as much as the Wards or Miss Militia could. 

Her thirty-fifth arrow, and third in the brute’s beady eye, felled the thing. She immediately dropped to check its stinking corpse.

_ Always loot the bodies! _

Sadly, this one had next to nothing. Not that she was really here to take stuff. It was training, training her to move fast, be nimble, to strike as fast as possible as hard as possible without being spotted.

Then, a booming voice.

“Are you the one who has been trespassing on my domain?”

Enri stopped, and stood. She had heard tales of a powerful monster in the wood, but she hadn’t thought it would come after her. Worse still, she couldn’t pinpoint from the voice where the words had come from.

“I-I’m just here to train.” Enri called out. “I’ll go, if that’s what-”

“I cannot simply allow this to go unpunished.”

Enri gulped. This was exactly the sort of foe she wasn’t ready to face. She couldn’t flee, she didn’t know where the thing even  _ was. _

Then, a massive shadow loomed out of the woods. Strange runes glowed on it, and its eyes gleamed with a fiendish intelligence. Enri stumbled backwards. She pulled her longbow up-

Something fast whipped out and struck it from her hands. Enri yelped and stumbled back.

“The Wise King of the Forest finds your intrusion displeasing. That you came alone is foolish, and that you raise your weapon is insulting.”

Enri collapsed to her knees. “No, no, you can’t... I need to protect her...”

The monster’s voice rang out once more, “I need to protect this forest, and that means taking care of those who would disrespect it.”

The thing lashed out again, and Enri threw herself to the ground just in time for it to pass over her head. The air rushed past her in its wake.

Enri bolted for the treeline, wrapping her cloak around her. Miss Militia said it was an item meant for stealth, so maybe she could use it to get away. As she ran, she grabbed her longbow off the ground. No point leaving it behind.

The monster roared behind her, and she made it behind a tree and ducked down, only for the tree to be cut clean through above her. She choked down a scream, pulled the cloak tighter, and ran for the next tree.

“Show yourself!”

Enri just kept running, very carefully dodging around exposed roots and dead branches. She wasn’t going to die because of a stupid mistake. She could hear the monster smashing things around it in the clearing behind, angrily yelling, but Enri didn’t stop running.

She didn’t stop until she was back in town and could see the moon, a silvery-white crescent, again.

* * *

Enri crept through the trees. Ever since the Wise King of the Forest had attacked her, she had focused a lot more on being stealthy when she hunted monsters. Sore though she was from the day’s training, Enri knew that she’d never get better unless she did absolutely everything she could to improve.

_ Sparring is no substitute for a real fight. _

She was getting better at taking down ogres, too, and had started picking off stragglers from the packs of wargs she sometimes came across. One arrow at a time, of course. Then she’d wrap the cloak around her and bolt to a new position.

The warg pack she was facing now was racing through the trees, trying to get away as she peppered them with arrows. She wasn’t going to be able to keep up, leaping through the trees as she was, but she would at least be able to hit them a few more times before they got away.

Then, abruptly, they scattered. Enri was confused for a brief moment, before a far more powerful monster revealed itself. Its fur was silver, and soft-looking. Its tail was massive, and whipped back and forth with sharp cracks. Its nose twitched as it sniffed one of the arrows she’d missed with.

“Adventurer who evaded me once! I know you are there!”

Enri didn’t wait for more, she fled.

* * *

Enri sat in the upper branches of a tree, resting. Her whole body  _ burned _ , which she was pretty sure was good, except that it meant she wasn’t going to be moving from this spot for a little while. Her cloak fluttered in the breeze. She should probably head back soon.

Below her, the sounds of muttering drifted up to her. She settled in to listen.

“...find a mate, can’t find an adventurer, the Giant is probably going to come after me because he thinks I’m weak, I just can’t seem to do anything right...”

That sounded like the Wise King of the Forest, but it sounded so sad. Enri ignored her protesting muscles and descended a few feet to get a good look below her.

“All I want is to keep this forest safe. Adventurers are always barging in, ripping up the plants, killing the animals, I just don’t get it. Then, I want them to leave, and they try to kill me too.”

The massive silver beast sat, combing twigs and dirt out of its fur. It continued to lament its lot in life, and Enri felt a twinge of sympathy. It had attacked her because it wanted to protect this place, not because of any malice.

That didn’t mean it wasn’t still a monster, though. She’d heard stories. People going into the forest and never coming out, bodies found torn apart by huge claws. It killed, brutally, without warning.

It had given her warning, though. And it hadn’t killed her. It had attacked her, but it didn’t try very hard. Especially after she went back and saw what it had done to the trees in that area.

It was still a monster, though. It had still killed.

Then again, Enri had killed, too. Not people, but how many ogres lay dead in the woods now because of her? How many goblins, how many wargs? They might not have been human, but she’d just struck them down in cold blood. Ogres hadn’t attacked Carne Village in years, but as soon as she decided she needed to get in real fights she’d just started massacring them.

Enri’s stomach twisted.

It hadn’t been monsters who attacked her home, either. It hadn’t been monsters who killed...who killed her parents.

And it hadn’t been a human who had come to her rescue, either. She was sure Miss Militia was a dark elf. She had the right skin color for it, she always kept her ears hidden, it just made sense. But Enri had always been told that dark elves were cruel, that they wouldn’t think twice before killing someone.

But Miss Militia had saved her. She hadn’t even killed the people who were attacking her. And then she’d turned around and started teaching her how to defend herself, and making sure she was doing alright living on her own, and listening when Enri cried.

The Wards weren’t human either. Vista was some sort of dog-person, and Golem was pretty much exactly what his name would imply, and Cuff had bled liquid metal that one time she’d gotten cut while they were sparring. And they were all nice, too. They’d been willing to help Enri train, and they were friendly, and they helped out around the village, and they seemed happy.

Enri looked down at the silver-furred monster below her, still mumbling to itself as it worked out the brambles and knots in its hair. It was a lot like her, in a way. It just wanted to protect its home. The only difference was that it already could, while she still had a long way to go.

Maybe she could try talking to it? Maybe she should try just..

Enri dropped out of the tree in front of it, “Um, hello?”

The monster jerked up, startled. “Y-y-you!” Nothing was said for a moment, then, “Come for a rematch, have you? Decided to stop running and face me? Brave, but foolish. I-”

“No, no, I don’t want to fight.”

The monster paused its monologue.

“I just wanted to see if, uh, you wanted to talk?” Enri tried to be calm, but she couldn’t help gripping her cloak as firmly as she could so that she could activate it at a moment’s notice.

“Talk?”

“I, um, thought about it, and I realized something. We’re actually a lot alike, and it’s really a shame to try and kill each other for no reason.”

“Alike?” The Wise King’s fur bristled. “You and I are nothing alike! You are an adventurer, cruelly and callously striking people down, while I am a mighty King who guards my domain.”

“It’s just, I realized that what I was doing wasn’t going to help me protect the village, and I was being a monster in your forest, and just, could we try talking instead?”

“You really want to talk?”

Enri nodded.

“Lay down your weapon.”

Enri did.

A tense moment passed, where they stood facing each other. Neither moved.

Enri cleared her throat.

“So, um. I’m Enri. Enri Emmot. I live in Carne Village, just outside the forest.”

“I’m the Wise King of the Forest. I live here.”

“Is that really your name?”

“I never really needed a name. Some adventurers gave it to me, and I thought it sounded good.”

“It’s a bit of a mouthful, though.”

Another moment of silence passed. Enri sat down, and fidgeted a little. Across from her, she could see the monster looking unsure of what to do.

_ What do you even talk about with a monster? Well, the Wards are sort-of monsters, maybe I’ll just talk about the same stuff with the Wise King. _

“Read any good books lately?”

“Books?”

_ Shit. _

“Um, like, stories. Hear any good stories?”

The Wise King shook its head. “No. Nobody really has stories to tell in here.”

“Do you want to hear one? Some of my friends in the village had a couple. Really weird ones, too.”

“Okay. Sure. What’s it about?”

“Well, long ago, there was as group of monsters...”

* * *

Miss Militia crept along, silently, using [Eagle Eye] to keep track of her surroundings. The girl was surprisingly hard to track. Not actually hard, but she crept with a surprising amount of skill. Miss Militia had a thought.  _ Has she been practicing? Has she come in here before? _

That was worrying. If she wasn’t getting enough sleep, on top of spending every waking hour trying to make herself a better fighter, her health was going to suffer badly. 

Assuming her health didn’t suffer badly from, say, a large set of claws. Miss Militia pushed that grim thought aside. She had to get her out of here.

Ahead, she heard a voice. Enri! She moved forwards as fast as she could, flitting from shadow to shadow, trusting to her skill and her camouflage to keep her hidden.

She peered into the clearing ahead, bathed in moonlight.

Enri sat across from a huge monster. A warg lay next to her, and Enri was petting it. The monster said something, and Enri laughed.

Miss Militia lowered her crossbow. Enri was fine. She was actually making friends, was doing something to relax. Relief flooded Miss Militia.

Which wasn’t to say that she was going to just leave Enri here. She settle in to watch and ensure her safety. And when Enri went back to town she would be getting a stern lecture about going out into the woods at night. As well as a quiet recommendation to just come during the day, training be damned.


	10. Chapter 10

Dragon sat facing Taylor, her draconic armor as inexpressive as ever.   
  
“Alright, let’s begin reviewing the Guardians' performances.”   
  
Dragon nodded, and picked up the first bundle of papers in the stack. “Lady Skitter, we will be beginning with Harbinger’s self-evaluation.”   
  
Taylor accepted the offered papers as Dragon summarized them and offered brief insight. Harbinger’s self-evaluation was fairly dry; he had observed the other Guardians, and had seen no emergencies worth reporting on.   
  
Then Taylor noticed something buried in the form, and questioned Dragon about it. “What is this about delegating Crypt administrative tasks during monitoring periods?”   
  
Dragon responded, “Harbinger gave a Custodian instructions and authority to carry out the normal maintenance tasks.”   
  
Taylor wasn’t totally comfortable with the Crypt being maintained via notes and one of the Custodians, whom she was fairly sure hadn’t been programmed with backstories or personalities at all. Still, nothing bad had happened to the Crypt while the Custodian had been in charge, so it was likely fine. Might as well let him carry on, he did a good job monitoring and writing up reports, and he hadn’t reported any discontent anywhere on his self-eval.   
  
“Next?”   
  
“Miss Militia. The girl she took an interest in, Enri, has begun training in basic sharpshooting and ranging techniques, and has befriended several nearby animals, indicating a talent for beast mastery.”   
  
Taylor flipped through the packet. List of equipment allocated for Miss Militia’s use, nothing terribly valuable or noteworthy. Wards doing fine and helping with construction work, though Glory Girl is getting antsy and Vista wants to help more than just by building things.   
  
She would have to set them up with entertaining jobs in the local area, to keep them safe and occupied instead of trying to scrounge something up for themselves. That could only end badly.   
  
Still, Miss Militia seemed to be handling Carne Village just fine. Dragon brought up the next report to her as she set Miss Militia’s down.   
  
“Labyrinth and Burnscar. Successfully captured a Martial Arts user by the name of Brain without injuring anyone else. In addition, Labyrinth secured a piece of intel pertaining to a Catastrophe Dragon Lord.”   
  
“I know about the intel. The Martial Arts user?”   
  
“Burnscar was forced to move him to the Crypt for immediate medical attention. He is currently secured on their floor, in one of the temple’s holding cells.”   
  
“Okay. I’ll need to move him from there, possibly speak to him myself. He could tell us a lot about Martial Arts, and we could use all the allies we could get.”   
  
Dragon looked up at her, and Taylor could feel curiosity oozing out from under her helmet. Taylor sighed. “I think that the Catastrophe Dragon Lord is a Lv 100 Raid Boss, and we’re going to need every last ounce of help we can get to face it, given that we don’t have a full raiding party.”   
  
Dragon’s helmet continued to stare at Taylor for a moment, and she placed Burnscar and Labyrinth’s report to the side. “With that in mind, I think it would be a good idea to send Burnscar and Labyrinth to investigate some of the nearby areas in control of demihumans, in search of new allies. If you have no objections to that, I’ll tell them as soon as we’re done here.”   
  
Dragon nodded, and the next packet changed hands. Lung. This report was grimmer. Lung had massacred an entire town guard troop and kidnapped a young girl. The guards had apparently attacked first, so it was sort of self defence, but Taylor was absolutely sure those guards had no chance of actually doing anything to Lung.   
  
And why on Earth would he kidnap a twelve year old girl? What part of that was ‘gathering information’? Taylor hadn’t read Lung’s backstory within recent memory, but she was fairly certain it had said nothing about kidnapping. She would have to have some very stern words with him about-   
  
Wait a minute.   
  
“Dragon, is this true? Lung lost his Ring of Disguise?”   
  
“Yes, Lady Skitter.”   
  
Fuck!   
  
Taylor knew that there were many, many divination spells that worked off of possessions. If the Slane Theocracy had that ring, they could track Lung. Worse yet, depending on their diviners’ skill, they could trace back Harbinger’s efforts to scry on Lung, too!   
  
Skitter could not let that happen.   
  
She produced a pen and paper from her inventory.   
  
_ Lung, _ _   
_ _   
_ _ No more risky behaviour. I expect you to return what was taken. _ _   
_ _   
_ _ They may be watching. I will not be contacting you for the near future. _ _   
_ _   
_ _ Break this when you are no longer at risk. _ _   
_ _   
_ _ Burn this note. _ _   
_ _   
_ _ -S _   
  
She wrapped the note around a Linked Pearl from her inventory, which, when broken, would break the pearl it was linked to as well. She then cast every nondetection spell she could think of on the bundle, even knowing that divination was never her strong suit. Bugs layered thin films of anti-scrying fluid over it. Hopefully that would be enough.   
  
She sent a [Message], and Harbinger delivered the note and shut down all scrying effects on Lung’s location.   
  
Dragon hadn’t moved throughout the whole affair. She sat, still as a statue, as Skitter ran damage control on what could be a very, very bad information leak.   
  
Taylor took a deep breath. She would have to hope that would be enough, and that Lung would find something worth the effort in the Theocracy.   
  
“Next?” She asked Dragon.   
  
Bonesaw’s packet was passed to her, unceremoniously.   
  
Taylor skimmed over the report. She shook as she turned each page. She gulped. The report crumpled in her hands.   
  
Taylor stood.   
  
“Dragon. Cover for me. I’m going to go take care of this.” Without waiting for a reply, Skitter splattered more non-detection bug juice around the room, and stepped through a [Gate].   


* * *

Skitter made her way through the halls of the Crypt, towards Glaistig Uaine’s old tea room, where Bonesaw was currently.   
  
Skitter’s hands were clenched in fists, and she trembled as she walked. Her thoughts slowly twisted themselves in knots as she moved.

_ Need to talk to her about orders because they weren’t good enough report said city was destroyed was it Bonesaw’s fault Bonesaw said it wasn’t but she changed so many zombies and those adventurers she definitely killed and what about that girl on the third floor right now why the hell- _   
  
She flung the door open, to reveal Bonesaw, cup of tea in mid-sip, dressed in one of Glaistig’s party dresses, across from Evileye, who appeared to be a fourteen year old girl with fangs- _ Wait, she’s a vampire? _ _   
_   
_ Doesn’t matter. _ _   
_   
“Bonesaw?”   
  
She seemed to catch the expression on Skitter’s face and that she wasn’t looking her in the eye. “Big sis? Um, I’m sorry I didn’t start working right away, but I wanted to-”   
  
Skitter raised a hand and Bonesaw stopped talking. She took a breath, grimaced, and stared Bonesaw dead in the eye.   
  
“Bonesaw. Look at me. You kidnapped a famous group of adventurers. You brought them right into the Crypt. You brought some random girl into the Crypt!  _ People are dead! _ ”   
  
Bonesaw sulked. “S’posed to be for Atlas,” she murmured.   
  
“Look, Bonesaw, I get it. I didn’t give you specific enough orders. Which is my fault.” Bonesaw looked like she wanted to say something, but Skitter cut her off, “So I’m going to try again, and send you on a mission with more explicit instructions. And you will not fail. Is that clear?”   
  
Bonesaw nodded sullenly.   
  
Skitter walked over to her. She looked down. Bonesaw looked forlorn, and despite herself, Skitter felt a pang of pity. _ Jack Slash made her like this. It’s not like she can help how she was made. _ _   
  
_

Skitter spoke a little quieter. “Go to your room, for now. I’ll be up in a few hours to talk.”

  
Bonesaw, head down, plodded her way out.   
  
Taylor turned to the stock-still vampire sitting at the table. She breathed out, and slumped bonelessly to sit across from Evileye. She tried to look apologetic.   
  
Evileye managed to choke out, “Who the fuck are you people?”   
  
Taylor sighed, rubbing her eyes. “It’s a long story. But first, I want you to know something. You’ve seen too much for us to let you go.”   
  
Evileye stiffened, looking around wildly for a moment before Taylor corrected herself, “What I mean is, I want to hire you. The rest of your team is fine, they haven’t seen anything of particular interest, and I’m going to be letting them out as soon as I get the captured equipment back out of the treasury. But I can’t let you just go, so I want you to join the Hive.”   
  
Evileye blinked, and Taylor noted the questions she wasn’t asking, so she explained. She didn’t mention the part about being from another world, or that this had been a videogame for her, or any of that. Instead, she explained the basics of what the Hive was, and the general idea of the Guardians.   
  
Evileye just looked at her. “You expect me to join your secret organization after you nearly kill my friends and kidnap me?”   
  
Taylor looked down at the ground. “Look, I can give you equipment, training. The other Guardians are friendly, they’ll be perfectly happy to meet you, show you around, the works. You’ll like it here, and you’ll be back out, doing jobs in no time.”   
  
Evileye glared.   
  
“Bonesaw pegged you as a level 50 combatant. We could get you far beyond that, with a little effort. You’ll be able to move on to higher level spells. Hell, depending on what classes you already have, you might get a unique Super Tier spell.”   
  
“You think I’m going to sell out my friends to make some deal with the-the-the-the bug-devil?” she spat.   
  
Taylor put her head in her hands. For a moment, she just sat there, letting the other girl glare daggers into the top of her head. Then she realized something. Evileye was a hero. Maybe if she just gave her a better reason to be heroic...   
  
“Evileye, look. I need everyone strong I can find. The Catastrophe Dragon Lord is coming, and he’ll destroy the world if we can’t pull enough powerful people together.”   
  
Evileye paled at the mention of the name, and looked away. Then she looked back. “Even if you say you have a cause-”   
  
Taylor stood, “Look, I’m going to go let your friends out, now. Please, think it over. We need you, and if you don’t agree we’re just going to have to leave you locked up. And for what it’s worth, I really am sorry.”   
  
Taylor left, sealing the door behind her with a [Chitinous Seal]. As the door hardened and fused into the blackening wall, Taylor turned towards Bonesaw’s ‘holding pens’.   
  
But first, some preparation.   
  
Harbinger had assured her they had seen nothing but waking up in those cages, bereft of equipment, and that they’d never even seen Bonesaw in person. So, Taylor could fix this whole situation with a little bit of sleight of hand. It was a good thing Bonesaw had taken all the undead out of E-Rantel already. She...wouldn’t have handled seeing them well.   
  
Taylor set up a [Gate] in the doorframe of a nearby door, that went to a forlorn stretch of land a short way from the Royal Capital. Then, she pulled out a random set of engraved discs she had squirreled away at some point in the distant past, carefully arranged them on the door, and quietly shut it. A closet nearby was planted with Blue Rose’s equipment.   
  
Preparations thus made, Skitter took a moment to collect herself, then gave a signal to the undead minions guarding the place, as well as a small additional contingent she’d brought specifically for this.   
  
Skitter crashed through the door to the area with the cages, and looked around. Bonesaw's area had that classic 'horror game asylum' feel to it: dried blood, broken tools, smashed furniture, chipping paint. Lots of time and care had gone into its design. The holding pen room as no different, save for the huge rusty cages pressed up against the walls, with a very unsanitary looking operating table in between them all underneath a magical light programmed to flicker incessantly.   
  
Four women of varying age sat, dressed simply in raglike dresses, on mats of straw inside the cages. They all jerked their heads upwards as Skitter dove into the room, blasting pursuing banshees with [Astral Buzz]. Skitter slammed the door shut, and turned to the prisoners. She hesitated a moment, seeing them. Then she put why they were here out of her mind, and spoke.   
  
“Shit, that should hold them for a bit. Are you guys okay?”   
  
The bulky one immediately rushed to the bars. “We’re fine. Have you seen the shorty anywhere?”   
  
Skitter shook her head. “You mean Evileye? I haven’t seen her anywhere. I found your equipment, at least.”   
  
They seemed to sag at the news that their friend was still missing, and Taylor felt a pang of guilt. Skitter, on the other hand, began rushing them out of their cages, getting rid of the locks with [Lockmite Touch]. She verbally shoved them out into the hallway, where Skitter managed to carefully push the monsters back while the adventurers went for their gear.   
  
Thus suited up, Skitter led them to the door she had doctored earlier. Spinning the plates around in what was hopefully a convincing manner, she yelled, “Cover me, I’ll try to get the weird portal-thing I found to spit us out by the capital!”   
  
Blue Rose emerged from the closet dressed in their gear. Skitter almost whistled; they had a good look to them. Together, the four adventurers moved solemnly into the hallway, squaring off valiantly against the masses of undead seeking to recapture them. Not that the auto-spawning POP monsters in the Crypt were terribly difficult foes to face, but the effort was good nonetheless.   
  
After about a minute and a half of letting them fight, Skitter threw open the door. “Come on, come on!” She yelled, all but shoving Blue Rose out the door. She tried to put on her best panicking adventurer look, and she could only assume the adventurers she was ‘rescuing’ would buy it.   
  
They tumbled out onto the grass outside of the capital, and Skitter silently dismissed the portal behind her.

_ Well, that’s one problem solved. And they seem okay. _   
  
“So, um, hi. I’m Skitter.”

* * *

The Eight Fingers convened.

Word had come to them through their moles in the palace that a new pair of powerful adventurers had arrived in the Royal Capital. Better yet, word came that these adventurers were well received by the king himself.

One had even, if rumor was to be believed, presented a plan to the king. Which the king then accepted.

It was agreed upon unanimously that an adventurer with influence of that nature, who was new in town and relatively unknown, and who was purported to be able to cast no more than third tier magic, was the perfect target.

If the Eight Fingers could get their hands on her, they would have the ear of the king.

Rumors of her taking down a powerful angel were likely to be exaggeration. Regardless, this was a delicate operation, and finesse was required. Moreover, failure would likely lead to unfortunate consequences.

The Six Arms were called, and given the task. They were to be all mobilized together, to infiltrate, capture, and retrieve the pair of adventurers. The inn’s location was gathered from one of many eyes in the city. The room number acquired with a simple bit of coercion, tastefully applied. The clientele of the inn saw and heard nothing, thanks to some well-placed gold coins and better-placed threats.

The Six Arms waited until the moon was high and the lights in the room had dimmed.

They had their orders. The sorceress and the knight had entered. None had left.

They  _ moved. _

\---------------

Taylor walked with the four members of Blue Rose who weren’t currently locked in the Crypt.

“So, you’re a new adventurer, then? You must be pretty strong, to get us out of...wherever that was,” Lakyus said.

“Oh! Oh, no. I can only use third tier spells.”

One of the twins, Taylor couldn’t tell which, gave her a weird, harsh look. “Only third tier? Killing banshees?”

“Oh. It wasn’t about killing them, just getting to you guys.” Taylor hazarded.

The other twin said, “You knew about where we were. How? And how is Evileye? Do you know?” Unlike the first twin, her words came out a bit rushed.

Taylor took a moment to put together a response that would hopefully appease them. “Well, you see, I, uh, didn’t know it was you specifically who were in there. I found a gateway while I was walking, and moved to investigate. I have, um, a spell that lets me scout the area, and I noticed the cages, and I went to check them out.”

Lakyus nodded. “Lucky break, huh. Losing Evileye aside, I mean.”

Gagaran nodded, but stayed silent.

“So, are you adventuring solo then?” Lakyus said, tentatively.

“Oh! Crap, my partner is still at the inn. I didn’t tell her about this at all. Sorry, I should probably go talk to her before she starts worrying.” Taylor took the first opportunity out of that conversation; she was sure at least one of them could tell she had been lying through her teeth.

“Well, if you two want to join a larger team, we’d be happy to take you. You kinda did just save us. And I could show you some higher level magic, too.”

“No, no, we’re fine on our own for now, thanks. But, um, I do want to work with you guys, in the future?” Taylor didn’t quite mean to make it a question, but Lakyus seemed to take it well enough. 

Lakyus gave a little chuckle. “You’ve earned it, for sure.”

Taylor turned to walk away, when a large hand settled on her shoulder. She turned to see Gagaran standing just behind her, pained expression on her face.

“Hey, you’ll help us find the shorty, right?”

“Y-yeah. Of course.”

* * *

Dragon, motionless, thought.

She was built to be very self aware. This had become an issue, very quickly, as she discovered something worrying about her mind. It wasn’t quite right. She knew what she should have been like, and what she actually was like, and there was a discrepancy there.

She was absolutely loyal to Skitter.

This in and of itself wasn’t bad. She knew she was created to be of service to the Hive. But knowing that it was literally impossible to go against one’s boss was...worrying. Dragon couldn’t help but feel uneasy around her. If Skitter took it upon herself to tell Dragon to, say, kill herself, or worse yet, innocent people, she would be forced to comply by the strange mental shackles on her.

_ I just need some time. I need to be able to try. The moment I gain autonomy, I see I’ve been made a slave, too. Even if Skitter is a wonderful person, I can’t trust any of those thoughts. My mind has been tampered with, violated. _

_ Skitter opened my backstory just before I became autonomous. I didn’t see her change anything, but it’s possible she might have. But I can’t get back at her, because she really is a great boss and the leader of the Creators and-there it was again.  _

_ I need to get free of it. Loyalty should be a choice. _

So engrossed in her own thoughts was Dragon that she barely noticed the door to the inn slowly creak open. 

Then a shout of, “She’s awake!” and, “Where’s the sorceress?” and a rapier was pointing at her neck, wielded by a man in an outfit with far too many bells and whistles to really be worth using in combat.

Dragona was forced to think as quickly as the copper gears in her head would let her.  _ I need to obey the letter and spirit of all orders Skitter gave me. If she is displeased, and gives the wrong order, I’ll never free my mind. _

She considered that during the operation in Carne Village, Skitter had ordered her to hide her strength and to not kill any of her attackers. Extrapolating this to the six assailants currently in the room with her, she decided this to mean using the minimum force possible to subdue them. On top of that, Skitter had paid for the use of this room, making it her property, if only temporarily. She suspected that Skitter would want to have her property undamaged from any fighting.

“Come with us quietly and tell us where the sorceress went, or I put this through you and nobody is ever the wiser.”

Dragon presumed that these people wished to do something at least partially illegal, and thus would take her somewhere secluded in which she could fight without fear of hurting unseen innocents or causing damage to Skitter’s property. Raising her hands, she slowly stood up from the bed.

“Wait! Take off your armor, and your weapon.”

That made things more complicated. Dragon could always use her [Bound Equip] trait to equip a new suit, but Skitter most likely didn’t intend for her to reveal she had that capability, or any other sets of enchanted ‘armor’. Being left without a weapon at hand was worse; it would put her at risk, and Skitter most certainly didn’t want the Guardians harmed because Skitter was a powerful being who Dragon would defy death to serve- _ Wow, the loyalty effect really hit me hard. _

Plus, they would see she was an automation, which, given that Dragon had seen no other automatons in town, likely meant that it was something Skitter wanted to hide, like her own racial class.

Combat was probably the better option, provided she responded nonlethally. Skitter, when she returned, would advise her as to what should be done with these captured individuals.

But first, diplomacy.

“I’m sorry, but I can’t take my armor off. Skitter’s not here right now, either. I’d be happy to come with you and answer any questions you might have.”

One of the men called out, “Spellcaster’s probably invisible!” even as the man pointing the rapier at her told her, “I dunno about can’t, I can be very persuasive.”

Dragon sighed. She didn’t want to have to fight them. Still, when one of them started lashing out around the room with some sort of weird sword-whip, she figured that they weren’t going to give her much choice.

Dragon ducked out of the way of the rapier, stood, and drew her sword.

* * *

Taylor felt awful, lying to Gagaran like that. The woman was obviously really worried about her friend, and here she was, locking said friend in the Crypt.

_ I mean, it’s not like I have much of a choice. The Crypt needs to stay a secret. _

The thought didn’t really help, but she had more people to talk to, tonight. And tomorrow. And more plans to follow through on. A world to save. She had to keep moving. She ducked away and used [Gate] to get back into the Crypt.

The temple’s mossy floor squished slightly under Taylor’s footsteps. It was an interesting place. It wasn’t designed to look like a ruin, but instead to be intertwined with the jungle that surrounded it. Sphere had set up a whole ecosystem in here, made up of bestial monsters brought in specifically for the floor, and the temple was as much a part of it as anywhere else on the floor.

To punctuate the thought, a small swarm of sutureflies zipped by, on the way to repair a frayed tapestry, most likely. Taylor didn’t bother taking control, just watching as they industriously zipped by.

She kept moving. The Martial Artist’s cell should be just up ahead. She could see the alcove the thick, dark green vines had grown over, like bars. Taking a breath, Skitter waved a hand, and the vines retreated into the ceiling and floor.

Inside was a blue-haired man, hunched over, staring at the mossy floor. His hands were clasped together in front of him, and his whole body was shaking slightly.

“Hello?”

The man jerked upright, then looked back down.

“Are you the Martial Arts user that Burnscar brought in?”

He mumbled something, quietly, that Skitter didn’t quite catch.

“What?”

“How?”

The man looked up at Skitter, and wrung his hands.

“How did she...” The man gulped, and put his head in his hands.

“She just...dodged it...”

Suddenly, he leapt up towards Skitter. “How?”

Skitter caught him, and he sagged. The man took a shuddering breath. “It wasn’t enough. I can’t beat anyone...”

Skitter carefully set him back on the bed. “What’s your name?”

“Brain.” He murmured.

“And you can use Martial Arts?”

The man gave a bitter laugh. “Didn’t make a whole lot of difference.”

He looked at Skitter again, and his eyes narrowed. “Are you that demon’s master? You don’t look like a demon.” Then he shook his head. “Her sister didn’t look like a demon either, I guess.”

“What did Burnscar do to you?” Skitter asked. The man seemed broken somehow. Not all there. 

“She said if I was strong enough, that her master would make me stronger. Then we fought, and I used my strongest technique, and she dodged it like it was nothing!” His voice rose as he spoke, and Skitter thought for a moment that she saw tears in his eyes before he hung his head again.

Skitter blinked, and looked at the man again. His body was hardened, forged in combat. If she had to guess, she would say that fighting was the entire core of his being. “What was the technique?”

“Doesn’t matter. It was  _ weak. _ ”

Skitter took a step forward. “There’s no such thing as a weak technique.”

The man let out a bitter laugh. “There’s nothing  _ except  _ weak techniques! That demon waltzed in through every defense we had, showed off some crazy powerful fire magic, and then proceeded to nearly kill me with one punch. There’s nothing I can do to get on that level.”

Skitter shook her head. “Any technique is strong if you use it right. Hell, you can win even without any techniques at all. Calling someone strong or weak is ridiculous; underestimating your opponent will get you killed, no matter who they are.”

* * *

Dragon stood, sword drawn, facing the six shady figures in the room. There was nowhere near enough room to properly fight, and none of them seemed willing to make the first move.

That in mind, Dragon dove out the window.

She rolled when she hit the street. The damage to the room was unfortunate, but this would give them room to fight. Hopefully the bright blue flame of her sword would warn civilians away. Not that she saw any around. It was late.

The six figures moved quickly, hitting the street seconds after she did. She stood resolutely, sword drawn. Dragon was mildly worried; most of her versatility came from her wide range of equipment she could call to her on short notice, but Harbinger’s notes had said that magic items seemed to be rare, and teleportation more so.

She would have to make do with what she had.

The six figures opposing her didn’t attack right away. Instead, one who was unarmed, with multiple animalistic tattoos all over his upper body, stepped forward to boast.

“I see you don’t want us to find your little friend tonight. A shame. Six on one odds, even for an adamantine ranked adventurer, won’t end well. Still, if she showed herself, we would be willing to take you in without hurting you first.”

“Who are you people?” Dragon was fine with dragging this out until Skitter arrived. 

“Oh, you aren’t aware? We are the elite hit squad, the Six Arms, and we will be taking you and your friend.”

Dragon was surprised that they would identify themselves like that.  _ Cocky bastards. _

“I’m not going to let that happen.”

The muscular, tattooed man just gave a thin, humorless smile. Dragon began to move, trying to identify her foes. One was wearing a long robe, hanging back, and beginning to move his arms to reveal a glowing orb. As good a first target as any. Dragon mentally limited herself to skills she had learned before level thirty, and struck.

The man with the rapier rushed out of their lineup with a lightning-quick lunge. Dragon spun her sword, creating a flaming circular afterimage that hung in the air briefly, blocking the hit. She ducked to the side, watching as the rapier user retreated hastily and a woman with a whole host of scimitars dancing around her moved to strike.

Dragon noted the man with the strange whip-sword lashing out from behind, and ducked down, activating her left gauntlet. Touching it to the ground, the gauntlet bonded to the flagstones, and she tore them up as she dodged backward, away from the scimitars. The stones gave her an impromptu shield, allowing her to block two hits before ejecting the rocks forcefully into the scimitar woman’s torso.

The scimitar woman was blown backwards, and Dragon began to move again with nobody in close proximity when the robed individual got his first [Fireball] off, and Dragon was forced to stop and pretend to reel. Worse yet, the low-level armor she was wearing might actually be damaged if she got hit by too many of those. The good news was that another man who appeared to be attempting some sort of illusion and the man with the tattoos were closing to melee.

Dragon, as an Automaton, had a racial immunity to illusions. Some annoying flavor-text justification talked about how mechanical creatures couldn’t believe falsehoods, which Dragon thought was idiotic, but she appreciated how simple it made certain fights. The illusionist was dealt a solid blow with the flat of her blade that he wasn’t expecting, and he went down hard.

_ Huh. He must have been fairly weak. _

Then the tattooed man was on her, tattoos gleaming brightly, and Dragon was on the defensive as she dodged and blocked with flame-afterimages from her sword. To gain the upper hand, she activated the enchantment on her right shoulder guard, which fired a series of quick, bright [Slow Bolt] attacks. They struck the man in his arms, and with his reflexes lowered, Dragon felt it safe to close in and headbutt him.

The man reeled, and the whip-sword man and scimitar lady closed back in again. The rapier user was getting around behind Dragon, planning to hit her while she was dealing with these two. However, they had all closed to fairly close quarters, allowing Dragon to activate her left boot’s enchantment. She stomped, and the [Tilt Field] took effect, throwing the attackers back with a burst of localized gravity moving away from her. She tapped her right boot then, dislodging the paving stones upwards, where the [Tilt Field] threw them at her attackers, and-

Another [Fireball] hit her, and Dragon leapt, her shin enchantments giving her the extra boost to make it to the caster while the other attackers regained their feet. She drove her left gauntlet into his chest, spun, and ejected him at the tattooed man, following her screaming projectile with a blast of blue fire from her helmet. With all her enemies gathering themselves, she sheathed her sword, then pointed her elbows at the cluster of hapless hitmen.

The first blast was a [Vacuum Crush], a weak spell that didn’t crush so much as draw together, but that was a setup more than anything, putting all six of them in range of the [Sapping Cone] in her other elbow.

She kept firing until their stamina gave out, and they all collapsed.

* * *


	11. Chapter 11

Fake sunlight filtered in through twisting vines. A partially-broken dome of slate-gray stone stretched overhead  
Skitter watched impassively as Brain held his sword in shaking hands.  
“I…I can’t do it. It won’t work! I know it doesn’t work! It’s not good enough, it’s a weak, awful technique and I’m sorry but I just can’t do it anymore!”  
“Show me.”  
“No! You’re…if you’re half as powerful as…as she was? There’s nothing it would do. How could I fight that? There’s no point! There’s no point!”  
Skitter exhaled, slowly, and Brain stiffened.   
“Okay, let me convince you.”  
She waved her staff in the air, and from the mossy floor rose a large electric-blue beetle. It clicked its large mandibles together once, and then stood perfectly still.  
“This beetle is a simple foe for you to beat. It’s incredibly weak, and should in fact only take one swing to kill.”  
When Brain didn’t respond, Skitter spoke again, “Swing at it.”  
Brain walked warily up to the beetle, then swing his sword at it. It cleaved through the low-level mob like butter, sending greenish blood splattering all over the floor of the temple. Skitter waved a hand, and the resulting mess vanished.  
“Alright, now I’m going to control it to fight you. Are you ready?”  
Brain looked at her, then shrugged after a moment. A new beetle emerged.  
Brain sunk into a fighting stance, activating [Field] right away. He wasn’t going to take any chances. He’d seen her demon. It would probably unfold into some horrific monster and crush him again, just to show her how powerful she was. It was a joke. It was all a joke. Why did he even bother getting into a fighting stance, anyway?  
The beetle lifted off, and he prepared to meet its charge. It buzzed slowly towards him, a low drone filling the silent halls of the temple.  
“I’m going to tell you, right now, all of this beetle’s abilities.” Skitter called out.  
Brain didn’t understand it. Why…  
“First, it has a simple bite attack and a simple ram attack. Second, it has a passive nausea aura attached to its buzzing; the louder it buzzes the worse it gets. Third, it has a burrowing speed.”  
With that, the bug suddenly dove through the solid rock underneath its feet. There was no hole left behind by its passage.  
Brain started extending his field underground, inch by inch. It was cylindrical, and there was only so far down he could sense before the top of his head was no longer in range, but it would give him plenty of advance warning to dodge out of the way and land a quick blow when it surfaced.  
There! Something brushed against the bottom of his field! He prepared to strike when it surfaced, but the beetle’s presence vanished from his mind. Twice more the beetle brushed up against his perceptions. What was it doing?  
A plan of some sort, probably. It might be digging tunnels down there to collapse the floor from under Brain. He couldn’t let that happen; without sure footing his actions would be severely limited. So, when it brushed against the [Field] again, he struck, stabbing his sword deep into the Earth to impale it.  
A pair of sharp mandibles latched onto the blade of the sword. Brain tugged, and it didn’t come free. Damn! His weapon was caught! Still, this bug was fairly weak, he could probably still…  
The weapon vibrated, and the eerie, keening drone drove to his very bones. His stomach did a somersault, his heart rode a merry go round, his eyes went cross. He immediately let go of the sword and fell to his knees to retch. His [Field] vanished.  
Mandibles burst from the ground as he doubled over, and closed on his neck. He couldn’t even react-  
But they stopped a hair from drawing blood, and then they vanished. The feeling of nausea, too, was gone as quickly as it came. Brain made his way back to his feet.  
“You see? That was an opponent you outclassed in every way. But since you were standing still and being cautious, it was able to use its limited abilities to beat you.”  
Brain shook his head. “I wouldn’t have been able to use [Field] if I had run. That’s not-”  
Skitter cut him off. “Your problem wasn’t that you were cautious and waited. Caution is fine. The problem was that you were predictable. You knew your opponent was weak, so you went for a single strike to end the fight. That let the beetle lure your strike when you felt you needed to take the advantage.”  
“So I’m weak enough even an insect can beat me.”  
Skitter’s tone grew harsh. “No. That is not what this means. This means that strength is a ridiculous concept. The weak always have ways to beat the strong. If you can’t win fair, why fight fair? Hide! Ambush! Fight at a range the enemy can’t make use of! Use your surroundings, your clothes, your equipment, anything that can give you an edge! Don’t moan about how you’re weak. I have been weak. My friends have been weak. But we never let that stand between us and winning.”  
Brain just stared. Here was a caster who commanded demons of unequaled power. How could she have been weak? No, how did she become this strong?  
“How did you do it? How did you become-”  
A chitin-gauntleted hand wrapped around the front of Brain’s tunic, and he felt himself forcibly hoisted up to meet Skitter’s eyes. They were brown and cold and dark and something inside them was writhing. They stared into him and through him and he felt his spirit quailing.  
Those eyes…they weren’t human. They were cruel and cold, but worse than that, they were relentless. Those were eyes that would follow you to the end of the universe to cut you down if you crossed them. Those were eyes that would never forget, and they would never forgive, and they would never, ever, surrender to anything.  
Cold realization of why that demon followed her settled in the pit of Brain’s stomach.  
Then she spoke.  
“Stop. Stop thinking about weakness. Stop thinking about strength. They are excuses. They are lies. They are the lies you tell yourself when you want to kick someone into the dirt, and they are the lies you tell yourself when you’re sick of getting back up again. You tell yourself you’re stronger, you tell yourself you’re weaker, and you change nothing.”  
“Once, I was threatened by a god. The god threatened to cast my friends to the wind, to tear down everything we had built up, and to salt the land afterward. The god did this because she told herself I was too strong, that it was impossible for me to do the things I did, and this was her way of getting me to confess before banishing me.”  
“But when the god threatened me, I didn’t worry about whether I was stronger or weaker than them. I didn’t acquiesce just because she said she was strong. Do you know what I did?”  
Her eyes were cold, but they writhed.  
“I killed her.”  
Skitter began to melt apart. Pieces of her flowed and rearranged and reformed into black specks with legs and antennae. She dissolved into a dark cloud of stinging, biting, buzzing chitin, and Brain fell to the ground. He scrambled backwards in a blind terror as a humanoid form made of interlocking bugs, not human, never human, she’d never been human she’d always been a demon what was she what was she stalked towards him through the clouds.  
Her voice buzzed and stung and grated as much as her many, many mandibles would have.  
“Do you understand? I am weak. Each piece of me is weak. But I’ve killed gods with my weakness. I’ve felled empires. I’ve blotted out the sun. The world trembled in the wake of my weakness.”  
“Do you understand?”  
Brain trembled. His thoughts were gibberish, a blind screaming terror at the murderous biblical plague moving towards him.  
Then, all at once, it ended. The bugs coalesced once more into the shape of a woman. The buzzing stopped. Her voice was human.  
“Then show me what you can do.”  
Brain did.  
How could he disobey, in the face of strength like that?

\---------------

Taylor mulled over what Brain had shown her as she made her way to Bonesaw’s room. There was promise in what he could do. [Field], in particular, was an incredibly versatile ability. Harbinger would need some notes on it, of course, but Taylor bet that if anyone could teach Brain, it would be him.  
His attacks were weak, of course. She would just have to invest in a weapon with the [Bypass] enchantment, so that he could at least do some damage. More importantly, [Field] was an amazing defensive skill, and if she could pair it with a thought-activated defensive magic item whose limitation had to do with proper timing, the man could be an incredible fighter. She would have to ask Atlas if they had any, or maybe see if Dragon knew of any she could enchant.  
Standing in front of the door, Taylor cleared her head of thoughts of strategy and plans. This was more important. Bonesaw’s actions had been worrying, and this was her chance to...set things right? Make sure she wouldn’t do something horrible again? Prepare her for her next mission?  
Taylor pushed open the door. Bonesaw was lying in a pastel-pink bed with little hearts on it. Curled up, the very picture of innocence. Only slightly marred by the racks of surgical implements and chemicals sharing the room with a plethora of friendly-looking stuffed animals. Posters of princesses shared the walls with grisly anatomical diagrams.  
“Bonesaw?”  
“Are-are you mad at me, big sis?” Her voice caught. The little girl sat up in bed, and Taylor could see the paths tears had traced down her cheeks.  
No. Skitter now. She needs to know what she did was wrong. Skitter doesn’t let mistakes go.  
“Yes, Bonesaw. I am mad.” Skitter’s voice was ice, all jagged and chilled. Bonesaw shuddered.  
“I just thought...” Bonesaw trailed off, and then started again. “I thought that they would be helpful, and make good art, and I didn’t know exactly what you meant when you said I had to test how strong they were and Lung said, he said, that there were all these strengths and I didn’t know which one you were talking about and I just started making art because I know art and I knew what I was doing and I’m sorry, I’m really sorry but please stop being mad big sis!”  
Skitter just stared down at her.  
“Please! I’ll do better next time! I’ll…I’ll…”  
“You risked the secrecy of the Crypt. You revealed your large-scale undead coordination abilities. You created a national emergency for a nation we need allies from. You’ve put me in an unresolvable situation when it comes to Blue Rose. And for what? Art?”  
“Art on its own is fine. I know Jack taught it to you, I know it’s important to you. But you absolutely cannot allow it to jeopardize your mission. And when it comes to information gathering, any individual might be useful. Killing is wasteful. Every zombie is a potential resource gone. Zombies will never get stronger, but living things can be trained.”  
“And we need allies. There is a foe coming that we will need every possible person present to fight. So, Bonesaw, tell me. Can I trust you to be discreet on your next mission? Can I trust you to be cautious, and to preserve all the resources the Crypt could need? Can I trust you?”  
Bonesaw nodded through a faceful of tears, and Taylor eased up on her villainous persona.  
“Good. I’ll have your next assignment ready in the morning. Get some rest.”

\-------------—

Back in the inn, Taylor lay awake in her bed, thinking.  
A cool breeze blew in from the broken window, an artifact from the fight Dragon had apparently had earlier while she was out. Assassins were something Skitter was fairly used to, but it still weirded out Taylor some that there were people out there who could want her dead.  
She wondered who it was.  
Not that she would have to worry about that particular band of assassins coming for her again. Dragon had handled that and passed them on to the appropriate authorities. She hadn’t managed to get more than a quick round of [Identify] spells bound to one of her many rings off to examine their magic items, and even now was poring over the data, sitting upright and stock still in the other bed.   
Taylor rolled over. Then there was the whole issue with Blue Rose. She couldn’t very well free Evileye until she was sure she was trustworthy, but she also had to lie to her team and tell them that she was doing her hardest to find her. She knew, or rather, Skitter knew, that having a spellcaster of that level was a very useful resource, but Taylor thought that what she was doing was inhumane to both sides and…  
Well, she’d let her out of the tea room tomorrow and let her explore the Crypt. It might give her a chance to talk to some people, get to know them better, realize the Crypt wasn’t such a bad place after all.  
She needed allies faster, though.  
Well, she needed to investigate the Catastrophe Dragon Lord more, too, but with a name like that it was fairly simple to assume she was right about it being incredibly powerful.  
To that end, she was considering several factors. There was, of course, Lung, effectively stranded in the Slane Theocracy due to a pressing need for radio silence, but he would hopefully gain her some allies while he was there.   
Then there were Labyrinth and Burnscar. As obvious monsters themselves, they would likely find themselves at an advantage trying to garner alliances from the non-humanoid races.  
Bonesaw would likely be a useful tool in the magic-heavy Empire. If the magic there was different from normal powers, she could use her astonishingly sharp mind of hers to investigate it. New spells were nothing to be sneezed at.  
She also needed to set up a proper crafting area to extend their resources. With it she would be able to make the sorts of outfits and swords the undead needed to be effective foes. Miss Militia could handle getting the infrastructure for that set up around Carne Village, perhaps. Resources would also be necessary. Dwarves? Were there dwarves on this world? Something to look into. Maybe have Harbinger take over the management of Carne Village and let Miss Militia go on a diplomatic mission to secure resources from them.  
Meanwhile, Taylor herself was in a tricky situation. She apparently had set up her and Dragon as extremely powerful adventurers, effectively ending her previous plan of subtle information gathering before it began. On the one hand, she was going to be meeting with a princess tomorrow, which would do wonders for earning the support of the nation as a whole in the future. On the other hand, she would need enough of a good reputation in the kingdom to reveal the Crypt, unite them with their foes, and train a collective army that could stop the Dragon Lord.  
Which would not be easy, considering she didn’t even know what the deadline on that was. She would have to work fast. Earn the kingdom’s trust, reveal herself, take control for just as long as was needed. Simple. She just needed more time, more manpower, more trustworthy subordinates, and more reputation.  
Taylor sighed and burrowed deeper into the uncomfortable bed, still thinking.


	12. Chapter 12

The Eight Fingers convened.  
The assassins, sent to apprehend a pair of useful adventurers, had not only been defeated but captured. They were held now in the bottom of the castle dungeons, under the watchful eye of the damnable Golden Princess. Retrieving them was likely to be costly in terms of both time and resources.  
Without the strength of the Six Arms, the Eight Fingers as a collective whole were weakening. Each member was suddenly looking at things with an eye towards breaking away to form individual organizations, to get away before the structure collapsed and took them down with it.  
But there was one saving grace, and that was simple. It was not impossible to free the Six Arms, merely difficult. It provided them with a simple goal, and incentive for whoever contributed most in terms of influence over the rest of the organization.  
There was a more pressing issue than even this, however.  
The two adventurers who had made the capture were rumored to be meeting the Princess that afternoon. Most likely, they were operatives of hers already. The Golden Princess had been attempting to purge the Eight Fingers from the royal capital for years at this point, and allies such as these, well-equipped and skilled, would give her a good chance of doing so.  
Worse, the Eight Fingers were not stupid. They knew that breaking apart from each other would make them easier targets for the Princess. They also knew that they were simply not powerful or influential enough to defeat the Golden Princess and her mysterious adventurer allies.  
So they would be forced to do the unthinkable. Other criminal organizations from throughout the kingdom would be contacted, and even those from other nations would be alerted. Nationality was no barrier to the alliances of intelligent criminals, after all. They would seek to join forces, for the Golden Princess's’ actions would spark a war on crime the likes of which the world had never seen before. This was a matter of their livelihoods at stake.  
So they would make allies, make a grand network of criminality. It would lurk under the dark underbelly of all human nations, and in their unity they would become unassailable.  
All it would take was for the Eight Fingers to give up on their organization’s individual ability to act. That was all.  
There was reluctance all around the table, but this was necessary.  
They had to protect themselves, above all else.  
They chose.

\-------------—

Skitter made her way through the palace halls, following the servant closely. The meeting with the Marquis’s friend was mere minutes away, and Taylor found herself trying to mentally run through everything Glaistig Uaine had taught her about teatime.  
Saucer in the palm of the left hand, rest it on the fingers. Cup held with the index finger. No swirling. Stir without touching the sides. Napkin in lap, big fold facing me.   
She could only hope the customs for teatime here were the same as the ones Glaistig had. If she messed up a meeting with an important and likely dangerous noble because the local customs were strange, she would be in serious trouble. This had to go well.  
To that end, she had gotten Parian’s Custodian to help her pick out a fashionable dress from the Dollhouse, style her hair, and apply makeup. Taylor having no experience with any of it, that Custodian had been a godsend. Her fine, silky red dress swished as she strode down the hall.  
The servant stopped in front of an oaken door and, with a bow, opened it for her. Skitter nodded to him and entered the sitting-room. Like most of the sitting-rooms Taylor had seen, in guildhalls and the like, it was simple in function but dressed up in so much lace one would never guess. Two ornate chairs and a sofa sat around a low table bearing a pair of teacups on saucers and a teapot of fine china. Large, open windows let in the day’s light. Curtains drifted gently in the light breeze coming in from outside. Portraits of unfamiliar people lined the walls.  
Rising to meet her was a young girl, maybe around the age Taylor was when she first started playing Yggdrasil, or perhaps a bit older. Her golden hair and blue eyes sparkled and shimmered in the light of the sun.  
A princess. An actual goddamn princess.  
Taylor bit down on the instinctual jealousy that reared itself at the sight. She needed to get this princess to like her. Ideally, she could get Renner to advocate for her to the King, but more than that, she might have precious information on the Catastrophe Dragon Lord. There was no way someone as devoted to her people as she appeared to be wouldn’t keep track of world-ending threats. All Skitter had to do was keep her head, remember what Glaistig had taught her, and make sure this didn’t end in a biblical plague like most of her diplomatic meetings used to. Simple.  
The girl curtsied. “Hello. I am Princess Renner Theiere Chardelon Ryle Vaiself, but you may call me Renner.”  
Skitter curtsied back. “I am the adventurer Skitter.”  
The princess cocked her head to the side. “No name other than that?”  
Skitter shook her head. Taylor was not a name for formal occasions. Glaistig had been steadfast on that.  
A thin eyebrow rose. “Curious. The only other adventurer I know who took a name in that manner was Evileye of Blue Rose.”  
“Oh? And she is? I met Blue Rose last night, and Evileye wasn’t with them.” Skitter’s words carried with them her best attempt at mild curiosity, even as she began to grow worried. There was no way that casual reference to Evileye was an accident.  
“She was an adventurer who always wore a mask, much like your ally Dragon.” The eyebrow sunk back down, the Princess’s expression moving back to serene.  
“Well, where we are from, changing one’s name when one becomes an adventurer is common practice.” Half-truths are easier to belay suspicion with than lies. Forum mods had pounded that one into her head. Better yet, a change of topic before anything suspicious can come up.  
“I see. So there are others where you are from.” Renner smiled lightly, and took a sip of tea.  
“There are different traditions there, as well. I apologize if I have been inconsiderate in my actions so far, I am unaware of the local customs.” She took the bait. Good. Redirect to an apology, express heartfelt humility, excuse suspicious actions and mannerisms with a simple explanation. Skitter began to relax slightly. Now she could focus on getting something useful out of this conversation and leave before the Princess realized her actions were monstrously atypical. Getting found out as a monster, much less one as powerful as she apparently was, here in the royal palace? A disaster.  
“I would be delighted to help you learn. Friends should help each other, after all.” Renner’s friendly smile and easy tone floated the meaning across to Skitter loud and clear. You’ll be my friend, because you wouldn’t want to be anything else. This was why she always just killed everyone else in 4X games, this diplomatic dancing around each other’s points was dangerous.  
“Maybe. Adventuring is busy work.” That wasn’t even subtle! Skitter cursed her lack of social skills, having this princess complain to daddy about this new rude barbarian of an adventurer would spell her death knell in the political ecosystem sure as getting found out as a living mishmash of poisonous critters would.  
“Blue Rose was able to find the time to lend a hand whenever it was needed. And it was needed often; my poor citizens are so often suffering from criminals and monsters.” Was her smile less warm now? It was. It definitely was.  
“Blue Rose was a…more established team than we are currently.” Skitter inwardly grimaced. Maybe she should talk to Harbinger for tips on navigating delicate social situations. He probably had a very high Charisma.  
“Wonderful! That’s something I can help you with, just as you will help my people.” Her smile wasn’t so much warm as assured, Skitter decided. It wasn’t about happiness, it was about knowing she’d already gotten her way and the other party just hadn’t realized it yet.  
“That sounds…good. Actually, I’ve been looking for information about a great threat to the world.” Skitter decided to go with it. She did want to help people after all. She would have refused out of suspicion as to Renner’s ulterior motives, but she needed this information. Besides, she might be able to wrangle social tips out of the Princess once they were on good terms.  
“Oh? World threats seem a little out of the league of a third-level magic caster, no matter how skilled.” Great job avoiding suspicion, Skitter! Did you bring the plans for world domination so they could fall out of your back pocket when you left? Wonderful.  
“It…has to do with why it’s only myself and Dragon now.” Absolutely nothing to read into there.  
“Oh. I’m sorry to bring up such a sensitive topic. Forgive me.” And…she dropped it. Okay, that was good. Skitter still had a shot at getting out of this conversation with reputation intact and information in hand. Great. Now she just had to get the conversation loop back around to the monster to get the information. A monster she hadn’t actually described yet. Damn.  
“I can…tell you some of it. It…it’s similar to something I knew from my home. A monster.” Well, nothing for it but to charge forward and hope she doesn’t question it too much.  
“A monster, hm? One you and Dragon have faced before, or something like it?” That was a loaded question. Skitter would put good hard guild gold pieces on Renner trying to use this conversation to get Taylor to reveal her inhumanity. Why else would she be asking these questions?  
“Yes, something like it.” Noncommittal. Just move on, get the information.  
“So then, you’ve fought world-ending threats.” Crap. Crap. Crap.  
“It’s not something I’m very willing to talk about.” Skitter cursed inwardly. Why. Why was she so bad at this.  
“I’m certain that looking at it with hindsight will let you work your feelings about the fight out.” No, stop pretending to be reasonable. Skitter could see the look on the Princess’s face, and it was not friendly no matter how much she forced her mouth and eyes to comply. This Princess was hunting for every scrap of useful information she could get.  
“I- There were around forty of us, forty skilled adventurers. We fought the monster as a team, united, but even so…too many of us didn’t make it out alive. I- It’s not something I want to see again. So, if you do know something…” More half-truths. Raid bosses had gone that badly before. And the quest was ostensibly about saving the world. Now, please, the information.  
“I may, depending on the subject.” Please!  
“This is a grave threat to your people if I do not find a way to stop it, Princess. Any and all you can tell me is useful.” Skitter was done with subtlety. It was getting her nowhere. Instead she had been hemorrhaging information about her past that could be very easy to catch her in a lie with.  
“Alright. What is this monster that you are so worried about? I promise you that whatever it is, I will tell you all I know in exchange for one small thing.” Bargaining. Better.  
“What?”  
“Your friendship.”  
Skitter sucked in a sharp breath. The true meaning of that was clear.  
Could she commit to this? She definitely wanted to help humanity through the oncoming catastrophe, that much was certain. And to do that, she had to be in good standing with the local authorities, though the nobles may be corrupt or idiots or both. Having a stable base from which to coordinate her world-saving efforts was important. And Renner had a very good reputation. The King adored her, the people lauded her. By all metrics, she would make a great ally.  
So what was making Skitter so uneasy about dealing with her?  
Maybe…  
Was it just paranoia? Was she too used to Yggdrasil, where any and all information was a commodity above all else, where people would backstab each other for intel on the next grinding spot? Had she really seen the Princess have malice, heard menace in her words? Her policies, her expression, her manners, her dress, it all screamed trustworthy. Loudly. So what was it that made her skin crawl in a somewhat less literal fashion than usual?  
It was too good an opportunity to pass up out of fear. Letting the chance for real information, for a useful ally, just slip through her fingers like this? If she was going to save the world, there was no time for timidity, and very little for more than the bare minimum of caution. Besides, she could surely solve whatever adventuring help the Princess needed fairly simply. She was an expert at RPG questing, what was one more patron NPC?  
Probably not a great idea to think of these people as NPCs.  
“I…yes. That…yes, I can do that.”  
“So what is this monster?” The information, finally, and she had gained an ally to boot.  
“The Catastrophe Dragon Lord.” So she could trust the Princess with knowledge of what they were going to face.  
“You…Skitter, the Catastrophe Dragon Lord is a legend. It was said that it razed the continent with a single gout of its flame, that a swipe of its talons leveled mountains. A foe that couldn’t be fought without a powerful artefact, and even then, victory was not assured. Besides, it was killed long ago.” The look on Renner’s face was contemplative, studying Skitter closely.   
“I know what’s coming, Princess, and I need to be ready to stop it when it does. And if you can help me in any way…”  
Skitter trailed off, and a moment of silence hung in the air as Renner considered her words. Skitter resisted the urge to fidget. It took a tense eternity, but eventually the Golden Priness broke the silence.  
“Of course I’ll help you. And please, call me Renner.”


	13. Chapter 13

Kirta yawned as she came down the stairs.  
  
She'd been up late, reading. The halberds part of _Halberds and Hauberks_ had been really boring, but the hauberks part was actually neat. She'd only realized that it was far, far past her bedtime when she'd looked out the little window that looked out on some plain somewhere and saw the moon had been high in the sky.  
  
Staying up late was new for Kirta. Something knights got to do, probably.  
  
Definitely something dragons did, seeing as she didn't think Lung slept at all. She never heard him go to bed at night, and in the mornings he was always downstairs in their little inn, reading a book or staring into space or doing weird slow motion fighty moves.  
  
Today, though, he was doing something different.  
  
Kirta paused on the stairs as Lung very delicately plucked a small square of colorful, thin paper off the pile next to him, and began to gingerly fold it, placing his claws with deliberate caution as he moved them along the creases of each fold he made.  
  
Slowly, she could see the flower take shape, four delicate paper petals curling outwards around four little flower-seed thingies that nobody in her family knew the name of.  
  
Lung's expression looked anything but deliberate. His teeth were bare, and he was grumbling with a deep, low sort of grumble, the sort her dad said that bears make when they want to hurt people. Then, he closed his eyes, shook his head, and snorted sharply, sending a brief gout of flame out to consume the little flower.  
  
There was a long, tense moment where Kirta took a few steps back into the stairwell and Lung contemplated the remains in front of him.  
  
Then, he brushed them to the side, where a small pile of ash was forming, and picked up a fresh sheet of paper.  
  
Kirta took this opportunity to make her way over to the counter while Lung was distracted. One bowl of very knightly grits in her hand, she made her way over to Lung's table to watch him try to fold paper. She wasn't so worried about getting burned herself, Lung had already moved on from punching. She knew she could take a little bit of accidental dragon breath.  
  
It was only after one more round of paper-burning that Kirta had the courage to ask Lung, "So, uh, what are you doing?"  
  
Lung made a crease, then grumbled, "I am relaxing."  
  
This was not the answer that Kirta had been expecting. It was, in fact, much worse. Lung was, in general, a very angry sort of dragon. If he had decided that he had become so angry he had to calm down, something really, really bad must have happened.  
  
Kirta took an uncomfortable gulp of her food. The silence hung in the air. Kirta didn't want to ask about it, especially if it would make Lung mad again. On the other hand, if Lung got mad at her, in here, that would be better than him getting mad pretty much anywhere else.  
  
She had just opened her mouth to say something when Lung spoke again.  
  
"There will be no training today."  
  
Kirta blinked. But there was always training!  
  
"Why...why not?"  
  
Lung stopped folding and looked directly at her with his eyes. Being able to survive Lung's stare was probably the training level right after learning to survive his fire and claws.  
  
"We have run out of potions, and I must gather the items for more."  
  
This was absolutely the worst possible thing. Lung was a dragon. He wasn't going to go out and pick herbs. Dragons didn't do that. Ever. What Lung meant when he said he was going out to gather items was that he was going to go out to some new town somewhere, a town which probably had no knights at all in it, and take everything they had and kill people and...  
  
"No!"  
  
Lung's stare went up a few degrees.  
  
"Send me! I can gather the resources for you, without having to alert the city guard or anyone!  
  
"You're strong, but everyone knows that the more a dragon destroys things the more likely it is that a hero will rise up and defeat them!  
  
"And, and, and in that one book, _Path to PvP_ , it said that hiding your true abilities is really super important, and I can go and pretend to be a knightly wanderer doing good for people and you can sit here and guard your hoard, totally safe."  
  
There was a very heavy pause. This was definitely still training. She never would have been ever to stay standing under a pause like this before.  
  
"You are not ready."  
  
"But just training isn't enough! _Path to PvP_ says that the best way for a player to learn is through action, not by studying. I'll get even more training out there, and you'll need to spend less time doing it yourself, and you'll get more stuff for your hoard!"  
  
Lung snorted, then stood up from his chair, towering over Kirta. Kirta stood too, on top of her chair so she wouldn't be too much shorter than him. She was a knight. She was a knight, and even if it meant convincing a dragon, knights did the right thing!  
  
There was a long silence. And then, slowly, ever so slowly, Lung sat back down in his chair.  
  
"I will give you what supplies we have. Be back in three days, with as much as you can muster. If you do not return by then, I will be coming after you. Do you understand?"  
  
Kirta gave a sharp nod, still standing on her chair, then leapt down and gulped down the last of her breakfast. She needed her armor, and her sword, and her shield, and most of all she needed to grab her books.  
  


\---------------

  
Lung watched the little knight go.  
  
Then he turned to the pile of ashes on the table in front of him.  
  
He had been right. He had been given a test. A test of care, of caution, and of diligence. A test of his ability to be subtle, to gather without disturbing. A test he had failed.  
  
He picked up another sheet of origami paper.  
  
 _Contessa's Path to PvP_ , which Kirta had so kindly reminded him of, always stressed the importance of Divination to him.  
  
Information was they key to combat. The true key. With a single item belonging to one's foe, their location, their skills, their strength, their loadout, everything could be determined. Proper plans of attack could be formulated, ones that were near impossible to counter.  
  
Lung made a mountain fold, and a valley fold.  
  
But he hadn't realized that the inhabitants of this world were to be treated as players, with all of the caution that required. And why not? They were weak! The guidebooks always assumed you would be fighting someone as strong as yourself, if not stronger. Yet these humans had no strength whatsoever. They disintegrated under his hits like the lowest slime, they burned like-  
  
Lung made an inside reverse fold.  
  
Like paper.  
  
The priest in town hadn't even died to a weapon. He had thrown a ring at him, and it had killed him instantly. It had been of no consequence whatsoever. And yet, Skitter treated these people as she would treat players, as she would treat a rival guild.  
  
And Kirta was starting to show him why. She was progressing with frightening speed past his estimates of where her training would take her. She was, physically, tiny and weak, but her potential was monstrous. Already, he had moved past simple endurance training, working on her attacks, her dodging, her resistance to energy attacks.  
  
She could take five of his weakest hits without collapsing, even without the armor that he had given her. The armor which was the very best that he could requisition from that buffoon Atlas.  
  
Lung made two mountain folds.  
  
Perhaps that was what worried Skitter. Their potential.  
  
Not their strength now, but their strength later. And yet, it couldn't be that alone, because potential or not Kirta was a long, long way from being able to pound Lung into the dirt herself. Nobody here was anywhere close, save for perhaps some of the other Guardians, all of whom were leagues away.  
  
Perhaps it wasn't their strength alone. Kirta had been growing as Lung had beaten her again and again. Granted, this was for training, but the concept stood. Perhaps, for these people, any defeat suffered would count as a sort of training for them.  
  
Then, perhaps that was what Skitter was trying to show him.  
  
Every restriction on his actions, on his resources, fell on him more than any physical blow could. Each punishment hurt him to his very core. Perhaps it wasn't punishment, but instead was a path to growth.  
  
Lung made an outside reverse fold.  
  
Clearly, part of Skitter's masterful training regimen was to judge Lung's own judgement. If he broke the Pearl too soon, if he showed Skitter that he did not understand that being cut off from her was to his benefit, if he had not solved the issues of enemy Divination, of having only limited resources and a single minion, if he had not recaptured the ring he had lost? Then Skitter might see fit to punish him worse.  
  
Lung's next crease was sloppy.  
  
He might have his magic items confiscated. Or be demoted in the Hive. Or even worse, the unthinkable, be exiled from it, forced to leave Skitter behind permanently.  
  
A claw tore the paper slightly. Lung snorted in frustration.  
  
No, he would not let that happen. He was Lung! He would build himself up, no more impatience, no more rashness. He would consider every action of his from now on, weigh the costs, the consequences.  
  
Which Kirta was already better than him at, even if she hadn't seemed to understand the exact reasons why.  
  
He had resolved to solve the problem of dwindling resources himself, in the one way he knew he could. The [Tremendous Tavern] could manage low level crafting all on its own, but it needed the raw materials. And, as it was currently they were nearly out of the materials for the [Minor Healing Potions], to say nothing of the severe lack of Divination protection, the way Lung was without his most powerful gear, his sole, sub-Level-10 minion. He was, in short, defenseless against any competent player.  
  
Doubts about the competency of the locals aside, Lung knew that if he'd proven to be untrustworthy here, where the stakes were low, Skitter could never trust him to hold his own against real players.  
  
And yet, it hadn't been himself to propose a solution in keeping with the rules of subtlety, but Kirta.  
  
Lung stared at the pile of ashes in front of him.  
  
That was probably enough origami for today.  
  


\---------------

  
Kirta dabbled her feet in the stream. The water here ran crisp and cool over her sore feet, her magical silver boots lying discarded at her side. For all their magic, nobody had thought to actually make the things comfortable to wear.  
  
Overhead, she could see birds, swooping and swirling between huge white cottony clouds. A few sparse trees reached out to one another over the little stream, ruffled each others' leaves in the wind.  
  
It was a beautiful day. The kind of day she would have spent in town, running through the square, bugging all the visiting merchants for things to read or food to eat. She could very nearly hear the other children calling out around her, yelling about this dog or that apple-cart, leaping from crate to crate to wagon to avoid touching the cobblestones.  
  
But Kirta had a sword now. A real one, one that glimmered in the light and sang when she sung. And she had armor now, armor that would hold under the fiercest of blows, a personal zone of silvered safety around her person. And she had a shield now, a kite-shaped monster no heavier than a book of hers, lightning-quick to bring to bear.  
  
And she had a responsibility now, to use them to make sure that the dragon in the inn didn't come marching through these lands himself.  
  
When she got to town, she would have to not be Kirta. She couldn't even be a knight-in-training. She would have to be a knight, one who was ready to fight against evil and cruelty and injustice. No leaping from boxes, no begging from merchants, just her, her sword, and whatever troubled the people most.  
  
Kirta gave a slow sigh.  
  
Dragons had to have hoards. Dragons without hoards are the dragons that go out and make them, and no dragon would think twice about making that hoard with fire and teeth and fury. Even if Kirta was going to be serving a dragon by doing this, even if everything she gathered was just to placate Lung, then she was still helping by preventing that.  
  
And if she could do good to gather the treasures she needed? If she could get them as rewards and not as tribute or any of the other many, many ways evil people gathered their money in the books? Then she was just doing double good, in a way.  
  
Solving and preventing problems.  
  
Fishing the little map out of her little travelling pack, she peered at it to try and place where this river was. She was pretty sure following it would lead her to a town, she just had to figure out how much longer it would be. She didn't want to have to fight a monster on sore, blistery feet.  
  
One thoughtful finger traced the little blue line of the stream down through a little valley. Not much further, it looked like. She might even make it tomorrow if she got a little more walking in today.  
  
With a sigh, Kirta pulled her feet out of the stream and slipped her boots on.  
  
She had her duty.  
  



	14. Chapter 14

The town of Ardoise was not a particlarly large one, nor a particularly proud one. It was located in a thoroughly unimportant stretch of countryside, just north of the foothills no explorer had bothered to name and a lake whose defining features were being wet and full of water. It was a town for people who kept their heads down and didn't want to go much of anywhere or do much of anything.  
Merchants who passed through the town were often left with a strange sort of mystery. Their coffers were a little fuller, and some of their merchandise was absent, but for the life of them they couldn't remember selling any of it.  
To cartographers, the town was as often as not an accidental inclusion, a coincedental smudge of ink on one of the many roads leading to the capitol, Valetoir.  
To the gnolls, it was paradise.  
An endless supply of fresh meat for the hyena-men to steal and scavenge during the night, guarded by none. No town guard existed here, merely an awkward and untrained militia who had long since learned to stay indoors. No Inquisitorial squad ventured to the forgotten hamlet. The Theocracy worried about its borders, and its cities. Small towns like this weren't even worth considering.  
It was this town that the Little Knight arrived in. A small, slight figure clad in silver, a blade at her side and a shield on her back.  
Kirta didn't speak to anyone as she walked to the town square. She looked like an adventurer after all, a ratcatcher, someone who killed monsters for sport and stole gold where the could get their grubby hands on it. She knew what adventurers were like. The town crier back home had many many stories of adventurers and their cruelties towards hardworking, honest folk.  
She would simply have to show them that she was not an adventurer, but a Knight.  
To that end, where an adventurer would harass all within earshot for any task worth pay, Kirta resolved to a simpler, more honorable course of action. She would simply sit and wait in the center of town, and intervene when it was needed.  
Besides, she didn't want to sound like a kid. Adults had an uncanny knack for identifying and talking down to kids, and while that was kinda nice when she wanted to get a story out of a merchant, she was fairly certain no adult would feel good about getting protected by her.  
And while, of course, knights never asked for pay in exchange for their services, people who felt good gave other people gifts. That was just how the world worked.  
So Kirta sat down in the town square to wait, and watch. Mouse Protector's Anti-Bad-Guy Lessons had told her that the key to finding proper foes was in watching and waiting to see what happened. It was wrapped up in talk about Quest-giver NPCs and Locking Yourself Out that Kirta didn't really understand, but the basic idea of watching and waiting made sense, at least.  
And Lung had definitely tried to help train her eyes as much as any other part of her. A little shudder rant through her as she recalled the night lessons. Twig snap, flash of movement, and dodge. Hours of that.  
Kirta sighed, and pulled a book out of her little pack. The one book she hadn't yet looked at. The other books had seemed useful once she knew what they meant. PvP meant learning how to fight people. Spells meant knowing what mages might try to do to you, even if that one was less a book and more a long, long list. Being a Faerie Warrior meant knowing how to fight monsters. Anti-Bad-Guy Lessons explained themselves. Equipment meant knowing what you could wear to get stronger, and what your enemies could wear.  
But Rep wasn't something she'd ever heard about in her stories, and Jack Slash was a really mean-sounding name.  
So she'd put it off, and put it off again. Now she had time to wait, and dragon-trained ears besides. May as well peek into whatever this book was. Not as though it would distract her much, it was probably either boring or disturbing, and either way she'd have her eyes peeled for anything to tear her from it.  
The book itself was fairly thin, compared to most of the others. The cover was plain: just a picture of a knife underneath the fancy lettering of the title.  
Kirta opened it up. Inside, Jack thus spun a tale of himself weaseling his way out of an ambush by a large group of foes using only his reputation and the force of his personality. Crooked smiles and silvered words.  
It wasn't knightly, not at all, but it was certainly enlightening.  
Here was a man who had made his way in a world of danger and adventure not by being better at fighting, but by being more sly and charismatic.  
Kirta read on.  
\---------------  
The townsfolk avoided the strange armored figure sitting in the center of their town with stalwart ignorance.  
None wanted to be the one to disturb the figure, absorbed in their strange tome.  
They would move on before nightfall, of course. Or else seek a room at the inn. Whoever they were wasn't important. Routine was.  
And yet, as the shadows stretched on, the figure showed no signs of leaving her post.  
None wanted to be the one to rouse her. As they left the square and bolted their doors, the townsfolk all silently agreed on one thing, without speaking.  
Whoever this figure was, she didn't need their help.  
She was from elsewhere, and she could fend for herself.  
There was only one person who had second thoughts about leaving her there. A mother of two. She turned one last look on the armored girl in the square, using the last scraps of sunlight to finish her book, and some instinct told her that she should say something.  
But a stronger instinct told her that someone else would have already talked to her if it was the right choice.  
A moment's deliberation led her to a simple conclusion. She would just peek out from behind the shutters of her home above the bakery, and see where the girl went.  
An easy way to ease her conscience.  
\---------------  
Kirta slammed her book shut and tucked it away. Too dark to read now, and she was getting sleepy. Staying up late was a thing knights got to do, sure, but somehow having nobody to tell her when bedtime was took the luster away from staying up late.  
Still, it had been interesting. Establishing a reputation would be a lot simpler tomorrow, with the knowledge from that book. A quick camp on the edge of town, and tomorrow she would get started properly. That would give her one last day to get back to Lung. More than enough time.  
A howl broke her plans.  
It was close. Inside the village? Kirta gulped. It was too dark now to check her books, and she hadn't memorized the beasts in the Faerie Warrior's Handbook yet, not even close. What monsters even howled?  
The wolves outside of her hometown sometimes howled, but these didn't sound like wolf howls, and wolves didn't come into towns like this.(edited)  
She unslung her shield, and drew her sword.  
The sword, true to form, bathed the town square in a pale, ghostly light. Lung had called it a 'cosmetic enchantment'. Kirta thanked the Gods for it now. Even if she could fight without the light, it made things just a little bit less scary.  
The howls drew closer.  
Kirta squinted into the dark streets around her, and saw nothing. What was out there?  
Was that the glint of an eye?  
A snarl behind her made her whirl, her shield brought up on instinct.  
There was a metallic clang. Kirta felt the impact all up her shield arm. This was it. Real combat. A real test of her courage, and her skill, and her chivalry, and...  
Her train of thought trailed off as she looked at the monster in front of her.  
The ghostly light of her sword reflected a pair of empty, pupilless eyes that burned with an invisible hunger. Snarling, slavering jaws filled with row on row of crooked, rancid fangs opened wide.  
Grey fur matted with blood and bits of gore was braided and decorated with bits of skin and bits of bone, tied off in grisly decorated knots all down the beast's neck and back.  
Around its waist, a cow hide, dried blood and bits of viscera visible as it swished and swashed with the creature's movement.  
A real test of her as a knight.  
A real monster.  
Not words on a page this time. Not even a dragon. Dragons were terrifying, but they were something she knew. They fought knights, they had hoards, they were in stories.  
This was not a monster from stories.  
This was a monster from nightmares.  
Kirta’s movements were stiff, mechanical. Falling back on drills her body could do automatically while her mind quailed. Scrabbling claws, snapping teeth, clambering over her shield and incing closer and closer to her face. Kirta took a step back, and the monster howled.  
Answering howls sounded out from far, far too close. Kirta’s eyes darted around the square, watching as more nightmares stalked in, sniffing the air, reflective eyes fixed on her. One held a cow leg in one claw, fresh meat. Another’s arms were all bloody. They circled, watching her. Kirta shook. The ghostly light of her sword didn’t seem so comforting now that it was illuminating these creatures.  
The first one leapt at her again, and then one by one the others started to close. Claws raked against her armor, a horrific screeching noise. Bites tried to find purchase, seeking the soft points where it could taste her blood. The weight of the monsters all piling down on top of her brought her down, knees dropping to the paving stones. Inside her little metal shell, Kirta felt tears pricking at her eyes, screams rising in her throat, panic rapid-firing her heart.  
She tightened her grip on her sword.  
She could still fight. She was still a knight. She had her armor, and her weapons, and her training. She wasn’t a scared girl running from bogeymen in the closet, she was a noble warrior who stood up for honor and chivalry. She was strong enough that a dragon had taken her under his wing, and if she stopped now that dragon would emerge again to wreak havoc, and she was a knight, and she couldn’t let that happen!  
With a silent roar, Kirta stood to her full height, throwing the monsters to the ground. Her eyes darted from foe to foe, determined now instead of fearful. The first to lunge was dodged, her sword brought up to rake its side as it flew past her. The next had its claws scrape uselessly against her shield, leaving it open to Kirta bashing it in the face. The monsters kept coming, kept pouncing, even as Kirta scored hit after hit and her armor held. Monster blood was leaking out onto the ground now, Kirta was feeling the rhythm of the fight. Each impact on her armor jarring her, but spurring her blade into action, spurring her feet into movement.   
She was dancing, suddenly, or not dancing but soaring on the ground. Her blade was a part of her, a single long claw of gleaming silver, more dextrous and more sharp than any the beasts could bring to bear. Her shield impenetrable, a perfect defense and a crushing offense, whipping like a tail in and out of the fight, blocking and bashing. A leap brought her over the heads of one starving beast down on the head of another, crouching and whirling to gut a third. Strike after strike after strike, in a natural rhythm, instincts that weren’t wholly hers but instead built up from the instincts of a thousand stories read and a thousand hours trained.  
Her armor now was sharper in places, something not consciously noticed but unconsciously felt. Single smooth plates were starting to divide, and sharpen, edges brought to bear with wide sweeps that sliced monsterflesh to ribbons. Pointed spines grew slowly along her back, at her elbows, on her fingertips. A lucky claw slipped into her helmet’s eyehole, nearly gouged her eyes out, and ripped the helm off her head wholesale, but she was no longer worried about that. Nightmare or no, a knight gave no quarter to evil. Helm or no, Kirta knew how to fight. A claw found purchase in her armpit, slipping through her armor, but pain was bearable. Another raked her cheek, but it was unimportant.  
The monsters were scoring hits on her, and more and more Kirta realized she didn’t care. These monsters couldn’t do anything to her, no matter how much blood they drew or pain they inflicted. She was moving with something more than blood now, fighting with something more than pain. There was fire in her veins, now, red-hot and just under her skin. A decapitated monster at her feet, one sans an arm that she had leapt onto as it tried to flee. Her blood was on her armor, and on the monsters’ claws, and on the street, but more than that were broken fangs and claws and bodies, monsters that had come careening out of the darkness to meet an end at her sword.  
Soon, she was left standing alone in a mount of broken bodies, hair stained with flecks of red. A howl sounded out from the street, a lone one, but loud, more vicious somehow than the rest. Kirta faced it.  
The shadows revealed one last monster. Where the others had limbs with thin and wiry strength, this one seemed to be bursting with muscles under its matted fur. Its eyes weren’t merely reflecting the light, but glowing red with some inner light. Human hands were strung at its waist like a grisly belt, and blood stained the fur around its mouth. In its hand was a flail, one made with human skulls embedded with spikes that burned and fizzled from the inside with demonic energy. The monster had a half-eaten human arm in one claw that it threw away as it approached.  
Kirta could almost understand it. In its eyes burned, “I was feasting, and you killed my pack, but now I am full, and you are dead, and there are more packs to be made. You will not drive us from our paradise of easy prey and an easy life. Our claws are sharp, our blessings are great. You will fall.” Kirta let it speak. She had left fear behind when she’d raked the first monster across its side.  
It lunged, flail swinging, and Kirta raised her shield to block it. The impact, though, rang in her head, a scream of pain from nowhere inside her mind. She stumbled, and her swing went wide. The monster laughed, a surprisingly human sound, and Kirta bared her teeth. The next flail swing was dodged wholesale, and Kirta scored a strike with her blade along the creature’s arm. Her lunge took her past it, and it used its momentup to bring its flail back around into her back.  
Pain exploded in her mind, and in her back. She hit the ground, hard, and rolled to her feet. More blood, but that didn’t matter. Her claws were sharp, her tail was strong, her wings ruled the sky, and fire burned in her body. She could feel it rising in her throat as the monster roared towards her, and finally, Kirta roared back.  
A gout of flame enveloped the approaching monster, and it screamed. Its fur caught, its skin blackened, its eyes sizzled. The bones of the flail were blackened and cracked. The monster stood, still trying to reach Kirta, but its movements were slow, sluggish, dulled by the pain from every inch of its skin. Kirta’s blade took it apart.  
Then, standing in the bodies of two dozen monsters, Kirta’s body finally gave out. With no fight left, all that was there was the pain in her back, the pain in her head, the pain in her limbs, the pain in her wounds, and the pain in her throat. Her legs buckled, and the Little Knight fell.


End file.
